DETERMINANTS OF PROCUREMENT PERFORMANCE AT KENYA NATIONAL HIGHWAYS AUTHORITY (KeNHA)

Robert Matindi

Masters Student, Jomo Kenyatta University of Agriculture and Technology

Dr. Gordon Karanja Ngugi

Lecturer, Jomo Kenyatta University of Agriculture and Technology

ABSTRACT

Public Procurement as a function of government includes decisions about the services that will be delivered to local authorities and the communities they serve. Many national and international instruments have been concerned with building an effective procurement system. As a commonwealth country, in Kenya there is a tendering unit in which the permanent secretary or chief accounting officer is the chairperson. The procurement units within ministries and department prepare and submit proposals for procurement in which qualities, quantities and prices are spelt out to the central tendering entities. In developing countries, public procurement is increasingly recognized as essential in service delivery and it accounts for a high proportion of total expenditure. The study focused on reviewing four variables i.e. management styles, organization culture, stakeholder influence, organizational influence and the government policy as the moderating variable. The target population for this study was 180 management staff from three levels of management. Stratified random sampling technique was employed to select the sample of 55 respondents, which is 30% of the target population. The study found out that the role of culture in organizational compliance has gained momentum; that awareness of the nature of public organizational culture is vital in explaining and assessing the appropriateness and outcome of the current reform process; that culture plays a central role in the compliance process and associated outcomes; that conformity and compliance are achieved through enforcement of formerly stated rules and procedures. The study also concludes that VFM is associated with deployment of resources for realization of some expected value in an economic, in efficient and effective manner; that transparent procurement procedures can contribute to a more efficient allocation of resources through increased competition; that procurement regulations are to harmonize public procurement performance in the public sector to ensure judicious, economic and efficient use of public resources.

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