LAHORE: Participants in a policy dialogue on ‘Procurement in education sector: enhancing transparency and accountability’ have called for implementation in letter and spirit of the existing laws instead of framing new ones.

Presided over by Punjab Assembly’s Standing Committee on Education member Rana Munawar Ghaus, the dialogue was arranged by the Institute of Social and Policy Sciences (I-SAPS) at a The Mall hotel on Tuesday. Prominent among the participants were MPAs Sadia Sohail (PTI), Khadija Umer (PML-Q), Farzana Butt, Nasreen Nawaz and Shehzadi Kabir (PML-N).

I-SAPS Research Fellow Hamid Masood proposed in the presentation on ‘Horizontal accountability and transparency in education sector procurements’ that the School Education Department (SED) should be given more powers in the procurement processes.

The SED should publish annual report, detailing the procurement processes, costs, timelines, complaints and the role of departments involved. Formation of a procurement committee in every school council, frequent auditing of records by the education department, enhancing the capacity of school council members in relation to procurement rules, financial management and record keeping were the other major proposals put forward in the presentation.

Haider Ali Daud of Bigger Picture Consulting briefed the participants on the salient features of the Punjab Public Procurement R terming procurement rules in Pakistan the toughest in the region, he said a lack of implementation had been the root cause of all the problems. He said education system in the public sector had stopped offering a promise for a better future and the need of the hour was to restore the confidence of the masses in this regard.

“We have to strike a balance between enrolments and quality of education,” he said.

SED Deputy Secretary Qaiser Rasheed said the proposals and recommendations in the presentations should be specific and not general in nature. The volume of allocations and their utilisation for schools have increased manifold but there were practical challenges which needed to be addressed.

Rana Ghous appreciated the work by I-SAPS and promised to raise the issue on the floor of the Punjab Assembly.

Published in Dawn, April 15th, 2015

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