Assessing the Impact of Digitalization on Public Procurement Efficiency in Nigeria: A Case Study of the Bureau of Public Procurement (BPP) and the Government Electronic-Procurement & Payment System (GePPS)

Governments looking to improve service delivery, lower transaction costs, and combat corruption, digitizing public procurement has become a strategic goal. The Bureau of Public Procurement (BPP) of Nigeria launched the Government Electronic-Procurement & Payment System (GePPS) in 2017. The effectiveness of government procurement between 2016 and 2022 is empirically assessed in this study. The study concludes that digitalization decreased average procurement cycle time by 27% and bid prices by 6.4% while increasing the number of qualified bidders per tender by 38% using a mixed-method design that incorporates difference-in-differences (DiD) analysis of 1,847 contracts with policy documents, academic literature, and institutional reports. Qualitative data indicates that the main mechanisms are vendor pre-qualification, real-time monitoring, and e-reverse auctioning. However, vendor reluctance, low digital literacy, and restricted internet coverage hinder improvements. Policy ideas for expanding digital procurement while addressing structural limitations are included in the paper's conclusion,