Benin report - Institut Africain de la Gouvernance

CHAPTER FIVE: CORPORATE GOVERNANCE__________________________________________________________________________WAEMU and 2.33% for the entire sub-Saharan Africa. This flow is linkedmainly to privatisation operations. According to UNCTAD (2005) 43 , the lowabsorptive capacities of the country, due mainly to the low level of educationand training of the workers, are such that DFI inflows seem to have hadlimited impact on the transfer of technologies and skills to Benin, with theexception of the new ICT sector and the banking sector.575. Goods and services markets. Although Benin‟s domestic market is quitesmall, the fact that the country lacks a true national legal competitionregulatory body with the necessary expertise, independence and materialresources 44 , coupled with the relative weakness of consumer defenceassociations, has often led to serious violations and infringements of the rulesof fair competition. This can be seen in the sale of poor quality and evendangerous products, false advertising, under or over-invoicing, no respect oftrademarks, below-cost pricing 45 , related sales and concerted price fixing, etc.576. All these are commonplace practices, especially in towns further inland, wheremarkets are often poorly organised and even the minimum infrastructureneeded for their proper functioning is lacking. Furthermore, somemanufacturers complain about the influx of Chinese goods into Benin‟smarkets and the failure of the Chamber of Commerce to sensitise citizens onthe need to rather consume locally made products.577. Despite the existence of community antitrust legislation adopted by WAEMU,no specific internal legislation regulates competition within the country.Consequently, all lawsuits concerning unfair competition brought before thecourts are tried on the basis of contract or civil law. The only sector that hasrecently been organised and endowed with specific, albeit provisional,directives is the telecommunications sector.578. Public procurement. There seems to be confusion in the minds of manypeople interviewed by the CRM about the notions of contract and publicprocurement. This shows the influence and ripple – or inhibitory – effect thatthe state of Benin exerts on the rest of the economy. The Public ProcurementCode of 30 January 1996 lays down the rules for free competition. Thisinstrument was supplemented by Decree 99-311 of 22 June 1999 instituting aCode of Ethics and Moralisation of Public Procurement, and Decree 99-312 of22 June 1999 fixing the thresholds and procedures for direct negotiation andcompetitive bidding, as well as the rules applicable to public procurement.After evaluating the public procurement system in 2002, the government setup the National Coordination and Monitoring Committee on the Reform ofPublic Contracts (CNCS) and started putting in place a new institutionalframework containing the provisions of the law amending the PublicProcurement Code adopted in August 2004.43 UNCTAD. 2005. Examen de la politique de l’investissement, Bénin. UN: New York and Geneva.44 The Foreign Trade Department, which is part of the Ministry of Trade, cannot replace a real nationalcompetition committee.45 These sales are often associated with the lack of cost accounting and, in the specific case of theinformal sector, with social and community price fixing.202