On 25 August, Prof Geo Quinot participated in the City of Cape Town’s annual EPCM Forum. The EPCM Forum celebrates achievement, fosters collaboration, and sparks innovation across the Engineering, Project, and Contract Management value chain within the City. The 2026 Forum focused on the theme, Excellence through Innovation and Maturity – Navigating Challenges, Driving Innovation, Delivering Excellence.
Prof Quinot shared insights from APLU’s recent policy paper on the implications of an increasing digital paradigm in public service delivery for public procurement regulation and policy in South Africa.
The recording of Prof Quinot’s presentation can be viewed here.
APLU Deputy Director, Prof Sope Williams, joined the George Washington Law School in Washington DC, as the E.K. and Justine Gubin Distinguished Visiting Professor of Government Contracts Law for a three-year term, starting in August 2026.
GW Law is home to the oldest and most established programme in public procurement law globally, having offered dedicated programmes in this area of law for over 60 years. APLU has enjoyed a long-standing relationship with the GW Law Government Procurement Law program, with many reciprocal visits between the two institutions and joining forces in various international projects.
While based at GW Law, Prof Williams will continue to be directly involved in all APLU’s projects and will continue to teach in Stellenbosch University’s postgraduate programmes in public procurement regulation and policy.
As part of its ongoing project of supporting public procurement (law) reform in South Africa, APLU hosted an in-person workshop in Johannesburg on 4 to 5 June 2026. The workshop was attended by about 180 persons comprising public procurement officials, policymakers, suppliers, procurement lawyers and academics.
The aim of the workshop was to create a space for deliberation on the draft General Public Procurement Regulations, 2026 published by National Treasury and open for public comment until 15 June 2026. By convening this workshop, APLU sought to sustain the South African public procurement community of practice and to facilitate a co-creation approach to crafting South Africa’s new public procurement system. The timing of the workshop was deliberately chosen to enable participants to refine their submissions on the draft regulations ahead of the submission deadline of 15 June. The workshop is complimented by a 10-part webinar series through which experts on various aspects of the draft procurement regulations discuss the draft (click here for more details on the series).
The workshop programme entailed sessions focusing on distinct parts of the draft regulations. In each session one or more experts introduced the relevant part and highlighted some considerations for discussion. The sessions allowed ample time for discussion among participants and the workshop was characterised by robust debate on various parts of the draft regulations.
South Africa’s digital transformation agenda — anchored in the National Data and Cloud Policy (2024), the Digital Government Policy Framework and most recently, the Roadmap for the Digital Transformation of Government (2025) — is structurally misaligned with its public procurement framework. The PFMA, MFMA, PPPFA and related instruments presuppose fixed specifications and static pricing, whereas cloud computing and digital public infrastructure operate through consumption-based, modular and iterative modalities. The result is implementation delays, fragmented adoption and reliance on deviations. The Public Procurement Act 2024, and particularly its imminent Regulations, offer a critical opportunity to realign procurement law with the technical and commercial realities of cloud and DPI.
This comprehensive report, prepared by Prof Geo Quinot and Mr Joshua Swart for APLU, is positioned as an intervention in both the public cloud policy development and public procurement reform in South Africa. Specifically, the report analyses the interaction between these developments. The ultimate aim is to inform the continued development of South Africa’s public procurement system, currently primarily through the development of the PPA Regulations, to align procurement law with the technical and commercial realities of cloud computing and DPI.
The central finding of this paper is that South Africa’s digital transformation challenge is no longer one of policy formulation, but of legal and institutional operability.
Jurisdictions that have successfully implemented cloud-enabled government have done so by adapting procurement frameworks to the technical and commercial realities of digital infrastructure. South Africa faces the same imperative: digital policy must now be translated into enforceable procurement rules, standards and institutional arrangements.
The Public Procurement Act 2024 provides a critical opportunity to achieve this translation, especially through the drafting of detailed implementation regulations under the Act.
To enable lawful, secure and scalable cloud adoption and DPI development, the PPA Regulations should incorporate the following elements.
On 16 April 2026, the South African National Treasury published draft regulations under the Public Procurement Act 2024 for public comment (see at thislink). Once promulgated, these regulations will enable the Act to commence.
Two sets of regulations were published, the draft Public Procurement Tribunal Regulations, 2026 and the draft General Public Procurement Regulations, 2026. In combination, these sets of regulations constitute a comprehensive set of rules to govern public procurement in South Africa in future. Public comments on the draft Tribunal regulations are due by 15 May and on the draft General regulations by 15 June.
APLU in partnership with Shaun Scott of Public Procurement Innovation Research (PPiR) is hosting a series of webinars on the Public Sector SCM Collaboration Platform to unpack the draft Regulations. The aim is to generate debate around the draft regulations and facilitate meaningful submissions. The series starts on 29 April at 10am (CAT) and continues until 10 June. Anyone is welcome to register at the link below.
In March 2026, the first SA Innovation Week was hosted by the Technology Innovation Agency (TIA) in partnership with South African Innovation Summit (SAIS) and supported by the Department of Science, Technology and Innovation (DSTI). SA Innovation Week (SAIW) is the official national platform connecting innovators, investors, industry leaders and policymakers in a coordinated, unconference, deal-making, outcomes-driven innovation platform designed to accelerate commercialisation and strengthen competitiveness.
SBRI Colloquium during SA Innovation Week (March 16–20)
APLU participated in one of the key events of the SA Innovation Week 2026, namely the SBRI (Small Business Research Initiative) Colloquium. The Colloquium, which was sponsored by the UK High Commission, focused on how public procurement can be a driver of innovation. Prof Quinot participated in one of the panel discussions at the Colloquium focusing on the role that law generally and the unfolding procurement law reform in South Africa in particular, can play in unlocking the potential of public procurement as a driver of innovation.
At the end of November 2025, APLU Director, Prof Geo Quinot, delivered the keynote address at the 5th Assembly of the African Public Procurement Network (APPN) that was hosted by the Government of Zimbabwe (which held the 2025 presidency of the APPN) at Victoria Falls. The APPN is the continental body bringing together the chief procurement offices of 53 African states to deliberate on matters of mutual interest. The General Assembly, composed of heads of national public procurement authorities, is the highest decision-making body of the APPN, setting strategic direction, electing leadership, and guiding key decisions at its annual assembly.
Speakers with the APPN Executive at the 5th APPN AssemblyQuinot delivering the keynote opening at the 5th APPN Assembly
In his opening keynote speech, Quinot argued that public procurement is one of the keys to unlocking the African continent’s full potential, but that it will only be possible if African states collectively and intentionally tailor their public procurement systems with optimal developmental objectives as primary objective while pursuing maximum integrity within and integration across national procurement systems. He outlined the various strands of public procurement law and policy where innovation is required to achieve these goals.
Prof Quinot also participated in a panel discussion during the course of the Assembly on Reinforcing Governance Through Public Procurement: A Social Contract Approach. This panel explored the ways in which public procurement systems should intentionally be anchored in the needs of societies turning such societies into primary structures of governance.
Panel on Reinforcing Governance Through Public Procurement: A Social Contract Approach
APLU researchers, Prof Geo Quinot and Prof Sope Williams, participated in several international engagements on public procurement law and policy during 2025.
Prof Williams participated in the 3rd International Congress of Public Procurement in Buenos Aires in November 2025, where she presented a paper on gender responsive procurement. In December, Williams participated in the Conference of the States Parties to the UN Convention against Corruption, held in Doha.
The 3rd International Congress of Public Procurement, University of Buenos Aires, Buenos Aires, Argentina
In September 2025, Prof Geo Quinot contributed to the 6th Interdisciplinary Symposium on Public Procurement, held in Lisbon, Portugal. He presented a paper on public procurement integrity at the digital frontier. In October, Quinot (virtually) delivered the keynote address at a conference on local content in public procurement hosted by the Polish Public Procurement Law Association (PPLA) and the Chair of European Law at the University of Warsaw’s Faculty of Law and Administration, Warsaw, Poland.
6th Interdisciplinary Symposium on Public Procurement, LisbonLocal content in public procurement, Warsaw
