South African President Cyril Ramaphosa signed into law the Public Procurement Act 28 of 2024 on 23 July 2024, marking a significant step towards fulfilling the constitutional obligations of state organs and other institutions identified in national legislation to conduct fair, transparent and cost-effective procurement.

Aside from upholding this constitutional objective, the Act mandates the soon-to-be-established Public Procurement Office to implement a technology-based procurement system to enhance efficiency and combat corruption. Furthermore, the Act requires the relevant Minister to introduce measures that enable the public and the media to access, scrutinize, and monitor procurement processes in order to promote transparency.

Inspired by the UK's public procurement laws, the Act includes provisions for procurement integrity and exclusionary provisions implemented through a debarment process, which was previously only addressed in bid documents. The Act also necessitates the establishment of a Public Procurement Tribunal, which will be responsible for reviewing any decisions made by the procuring institution to debar or reconsider a decision to award a bid.

With the Act now signed into law, we eagerly anticipate the publishing of the date on which the Act will come into effect, as well as the rollout of the accompanying regulations to fully implement this transformative legislation.

Written by Verushca Pillay, Partner, Corporate/M&A, Thato Mkhize, Associate, Dispute Resolution, and Frederick Pedro, Candidate Attorney, Baker McKenzie Johannesburg