From “No Objection” to National Theft: Has the BPP Failed to Stop Nigeria’s Procurement Cartel?

When the Public Procurement Act was signed into law in 2007, it was presented as a major breakthrough in Nigeria’s fight against corruption. The Bureau of Public Procurement (BPP) was established to ensure transparency, competitive bidding, and value for money in public contracting. Its most powerful tool, the Certificate of No Objection, was designed to prevent inflated contracts and procurement fraud before public funds were released.

Nearly two decades later, however, procurement fraud remains one of the biggest channels through which public resources disappear. The question is no longer whether Nigeria has procurement laws. The question is whether the institution responsible for enforcing them has become too weak or too compromised to stop the system it was created to regulate.

Claims of Trillions Saved, Yet Corruption Persists

The BPP frequently celebrates the billions and trillions of naira it claims to have saved the government through procurement reviews. Yet the evidence emerging from anti-corruption agencies paints a different picture.

ICPC Chairman, Dr. Musa Adamu Aliyu, has repeatedly warned about widespread procurement abuses, including inflated contracts, abandoned projects, duplicated projects, and collusion between contractors and public officials.

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Through its Constituency and Executive Projects Tracking Initiative, the Commission continues to uncover projects that exist only on paper, projects located on private property, and contracts that fail to deliver value despite receiving official approvals.

If procurement oversight is working effectively, why do these irregularities continue to surface across government agencies?

The ₦105 Billion Question

Perhaps one of the strongest indictments of the procurement system comes from findings contained in Auditor-General reports and investigations highlighted by BusinessDay. In its widely discussed investigation, How the 2007 Public Procurement Act Failed, the newspaper documented how Ministries, Departments and Agencies routinely circumvent procurement regulations through contract splitting, inflated invoices, selective bidding processes, and other practices designed to evade scrutiny.

The investigation referenced procurement infractions exceeding ₦105 billion, exposing how agencies deliberately bypassed procurement thresholds established under the law. Such violations raise concerns not only about the conduct of the agencies involved but also about the effectiveness of the oversight mechanisms meant to detect and prevent them.

When Unregistered Companies Win Public Contracts

The COVID-19 procurement era exposed another major weakness in the system.

Investigations by the International Centre for Investigative Reporting (ICIR) and Dataphyte revealed cases where government contracts were awarded to questionable entities and companies with limited or unclear operational records. One particularly controversial case involved the Federal Ministry of Water Resources, which reportedly awarded approximately ₦1.02 billion in Water, Sanitation and Hygiene (WASH) contracts to companies that were not properly registered, despite provisions of the Public Procurement Act requiring contractors to meet specific eligibility standards.

Similar concerns emerged around emergency procurement activities involving other agencies, including the Nigeria Centre for Disease Control (NCDC), where transparency advocates questioned whether genuine competitive bidding had taken place.

These findings exposed serious weaknesses in contractor verification processes and raised concerns that politically connected shell companies can still navigate the procurement system with relative ease.

Transparency Without Accountability

In response to growing criticism, the BPP has championed reforms such as the Nigeria Open Contracting Portal (NOCOPO), intended to make procurement information publicly accessible and improve accountability.

Yet transparency groups remain unconvinced. Organisations such as BudgIT and the Network for the Fight Against Corruption and Trafficking (NEFGAD) have repeatedly criticised poor compliance with disclosure requirements. According to their assessments, critical procurement information is often missing, delayed, incomplete, or difficult for citizens to access.

The result is a transparency framework that looks impressive on paper but often fails to provide meaningful scrutiny of how public funds are spent.

More troubling is the absence of visible consequences. Contractors accused of procurement violations are rarely subjected to long-term sanctions, while prosecutions involving procurement-related offences remain relatively uncommon compared to the scale of the problem.

The Cartel Behind the Contracts

Many governance experts argue that the real challenge is not administrative incompetence but systemic capture. Procurement decisions often involve powerful political actors, senior civil servants, contractors, and vested interests with significant influence over public spending.

Within such an environment, the BPP increasingly appears to function as a procedural checkpoint rather than a formidable enforcement agency. The institution may issue certificates and conduct reviews, but procurement fraud continues to dominate corruption investigations by both the ICPC and the EFCC.

For many observers, this raises an uncomfortable possibility: that the procurement system has become so deeply embedded in political and bureaucratic interests that oversight mechanisms struggle to act independently.

Reform or Reinvention?

Nigeria does not need more procurement regulations. It needs enforcement.

Experts have proposed mandatory real-time verification of contractors through integrated databases linked to the Corporate Affairs Commission, automatic rejection of unregistered companies, independent audits of high-value No Objection Certificates, and criminal liability for officials who knowingly approve fraudulent procurements.

Without such reforms, the Bureau risks being remembered not as the institution that dismantled Nigeria’s procurement cartel, but as the institution that watched it thrive.

Every inflated contract means fewer hospitals, fewer schools, poorer infrastructure, and fewer opportunities for economic growth. Until accountability becomes as important as compliance, the famous Certificate of No Objection will continue to face a difficult question from Nigerians: is it a shield against corruption or merely a stamp that allows corruption to proceed legally?

Call to Action

The Federal Government must strengthen contractor verification, enforce procurement laws, conduct independent audits of high value contracts, and impose stricter sanctions on officials and contractors who violate the rules. Civil society, the media, and anti-corruption agencies must also continue to demand greater transparency and accountability in public spending.

Conclusion

Nearly two decades after the Public Procurement Act was enacted, procurement fraud remains a major challenge. Investigations by BusinessDay, ICIR, Dataphyte, and findings from the Auditor General continue to expose weaknesses in the system, raising concerns about the effectiveness of procurement oversight. Until accountability and enforcement become as important as compliance, questions will remain about whether the No Objection Certificate is truly preventing corruption or merely legitimising a flawed procurement process.