11. Political Polarisation, Compromised Procurement and Poor Service Delivery in the Kingdom of Lesotho

This chapter traces the factors that led to political polarisation and how this engendered corruption and compromised procurement and, in turn, how corruption in public procurement has negatively affected service delivery in the Kingdom of Lesotho (henceforth Lesotho). Essentially, the process of public procurement involves administration of large volumes of money, goods and services and this predisposes such a process to corruption. Literature points to a wide variety of underlying reasons driving corruption in general (Søreide in Corruption in Public Procurement: Causes, Consequences and Cures, 2002) and public procurement corruption in particular in Lesotho, including the country’s socio-economic, political, and administrative conditions (Toeba in Law and Development Review 11: 397–431, 2018), fragile and weak state institutions (Mothibe in Towards an Anatomy of Persistent Political Instability in Lesotho, 1966–2016, National University of Lesotho & Open Society Initiative for Southern Africa, Roma, 2017) and political leadership that focuses on self-interest (Thabane, Towards an Anatomy of Persistent Political Instability in Lesotho, 1966–2016, National University of Lesotho & Open Society Initiative for Southern Africa, 2017). This combined descriptive and analytical chapter, which is based on desktop research and personal observations concludes that although the existing legal framework around public procurement is generally sufficient but the main challenge is that processes are systematically manipulated, skillfully bypassed and deliberatively undermined and, therefore, cannot ensure transparency and accountability. Informed by this state of affairs, the recommendations arrived at include the dire need for legal reforms and administrative considerations to strengthen procurement processes in Lesotho.