ABSTRACT
Local governments are required to deliver services and to construct and/or maintain infrastructure for the communities that they serve. Increasingly across the developing world this responsibility results in the purchase of goods from and payments made to the private sector in order to provide services and perform works on their behalf (Govender and Watermeyer, 2001). With the growth of decentralization over the past decade, there has been also a growing trend towards the privatization of services and activities that were the traditional functions of local governments. Accordingly, public procurement emerges as an important activity of local government. Procurement is a tool through which a client acquires services from a service provider with procurement documents defining the roles and responsibilities of both parties (Sahle, 2002). Public procurement involves local governments in securing the services of the private sector, which enters into contractual relationships with local government to provide these services or to undertake these activities on their behalf. Procurement involves the process that creates, manages, and concludes contracts with the private sector for such goods and services (Watermeyer, 2000a).
