Kinshasa: the public procurement disputes in DRC, the subject of a Master’s thesis

Kinshasa, August 30^th, 2026 (CPA).- The public procurement disputes in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, including the exercise of prior administrative remedies and judicial appeals, have been examined on Saturday at the University of Kinshasa, the country’s capital, during the defense of a thesis for a Diploma of Specialized Studies in Law. ‘This study has enabled us to distinguish public procurement litigation from the general framework of administrative litigation: on the one hand, public procurement litigation involves specific bodies and time limits for the exercise of preliminary administrative remedies; on the other hand, the exercise of judicial remedies presents specific features depending on whether the dispute is pre-contractual or contractual,’ has declared Peguy Fila, author of the memory. The candidate has explained that pre-contractual public procurement disputes are essentially based on compliance with the principles governing the procedure for the award, management, supervision and performance of public contracts, whilst emphasizing the principles of free access to public procurement, equal treatment of candidates and transparency of procedures. The author has further explained that such disputes are handled administratively by the contracting authority and the Dispute Resolution Committee (CRD) of the Public Procurement Regulatory Authority (ARMP) in DRC. He has also indicated that ‘the latter (the CRD) struggles to process the appeals submitted to it within 15 days, to such an extent that, in the majority of its decisions, it issues an interim ruling requesting an extension of that time limit’. “The quantitative and qualitative impact of the non-judicial settlement of pre-contractual public procurement disputes by the ARMP’s CRD on the role of the administrative court in such litigation is significant, as the administrative court is called upon less frequently,” has explained Mr. Fila. The petitioner has, however, acknowledged that contractual disputes relating to public procurement are ‘rather rare’ before the administrative courts, whilst recognizing that this rarity is due to the fact that Congolese public procurement law does not provide for new remedies accessible to litigants. Since the Belgian colonial era, public procurement has been the subject of legal disputes. This area of litigation has undergone a remarkable evolution following the Constitution of February 18^th, 2006, under which the Act of April 27^th, 2010 on public procurement operates, including all its implementing measures and the Organic Act on Administrative Courts.