Case Study – Public Procurement Big Contracting

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Another activity of our project Improve Integrity of Public Contractors was the preparation of two case studies for two large public contracts and procurements. The objects of the first one is the Concessionary Agreement for the financing, design, renovation, supply, reorganization and functioning of the PPP concessionary for providing laboratory services to hospitals, regional and municipal ones. The second case study refers to the procedure for Buying uniforms for the State Police for several years.

The first procedure is a procedure conducted in 2017 and finalized with a contract being awarded only in 2019. The selection was done through an open tender and a consortium of several companies was selected as the winner, [1]with these companies established a concessionary company later[2]. The procedure was followed by wide debate about the selection of the winning operator, as one of the companies of the winning consortium was registered in a country under the shell regime. The local authorities did not demonstrate any efforts to make any verifications of the integrity of this company or to check for potential conflicts of interest of its owner(s).

The case study developed as part of the project identified some wrong procedures that had already been opposed by the Government-contracted Consultant. Upon review of this case study, it was found that:

1) The Contracting Authority – the Ministry of Health, did not meet one of the essential conditions provided by the Law and Regulations on concessions/PPPs, namely: The legal obligation of comparing the PPP Model with the Public procurement to prove the cost effectiveness of the PPP project compared to the Public procurement, which would allow for the development of this Project;

2) The Contracting Authority has not published any reference for the financial analysis based on technical, quantitative, or statistical elements for the laboratory services as the basis for calculating the value of the Project in the amount of 13,005,966,000 lekë, without VAT;

3) The Implementation of the Laboratory Project for almost the entire Territory of the Republic of Albania carries an edit risk for the Public party, because in case of failure, this could lead to collapse of the Public laboratory system, which would be a health catastrophe;

4) The Contracting Authority has failed to deliver on its commitment to reduce the social impact of the project.

5) The Winner of the Project is selected in contradiction with the legal framework on concession/PPPs, the criteria published by The Contracting Authority, and without taking into consideration the Opinion of the IFC international expert;

6) The contract does not provide for one of the main insurances for projects of this nature, such as “Insurance of Professional Liability”.

Find the Case Study HERE (Albanian) and Here ( English)

The case of central purchases represents the highest value tender held so far by the Central Purchasing Authority. This tender is held on behalf of the State Police Directorate. The procedure selected for contracting in this case is a particular procedure rarely used, given its limits regarding the high monetary values. What is interesting is that this tender is being held at the same time the project is implemented. This case was selected given the problems already evident with the type of procedure followed[3], already excluding interested operators from competing by selecting them through the limited procedure

Find the Case Study – Here ( Albanian)

[1] http://openprocurement.al/sq/hconcession/view/id/6

[2] http://opencorporates.al/sq/nuis/L91923002T

[3] http://openprocurement.al/sq/agency/view/id/344

Purchases for Covid-19 Situation, the Albanian Government applies Secrete Contracts, bypassing Participation and Transparency

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AIS, an organization promoting Open Data Albania, observes with concern that the Albanian Government has decided, in an anti-constitutional manner, illegally, and without any legitimate need, to consider Secret Contracting and Procedures for purchasing during the emergency created by Covid-19.

 

  • Through two Decisions of Council of Ministers (DCM), namely: DCM No. 203, dated 26.02.2020 “On procedures to be used for signing Contracts dictated by the State Essential Interest” and amendments made by DCM No. 242, dated 22.03.2020 “On some amendments to Decision No. 203”, the Council of Ministers considers procedures and contracting related to Covid-19 as equal to Secret Contracting LINK.
  • This DCM is in contradiction with the Constitution. Article 118, paragraph 2 of the Constitution of the Republic of Albania provides that “The Law shall authorize the issuance of secondary legislation, assign a competent body, issues to be regulated, as well as the principles on the basis of which such legislation is issued”. Article 6 of the Public Procurement Law (which the Council of Ministers refers to in issuing this DCM) does not authorize the issuance of any Special Normative Acts for secret contracts, contracts requiring special safeguards, or contracts dictated by the state essential interest. DCM No. 203 does not contain any definition of the situation, circumstances, or cases when “state esential interest” are applicable, but leaves it under the case-by-case discretion of the contracting authorities; In other words, the term “state essential interest” is not legally regulated, and it remains an abstract concept, which is not defined, and which is left up to the subjective decision of the authorities, increasing thus the risk of arbitrariness.
  • The above-mentioned Decisions of the Council of Ministers lead to situations, where clients are selected without any published calls for expression of interest, which makes it impossible to identify and look for efficient operators. In this time of crisis, the possibilities for supplies are limited and characterized by dynamic changes. Many are applying innovative forms, in order to enable as fast tracing and identification of the leading suppliers as possible, ensuring supplies in the current situation. Governments cannot trace these suppliers by communicating with one client only, leaving no room for presentation and participation. This approach violates every Principle of Participation and Competition.
  • The Government has made an unjustified intervention, as long as the Albanian Legislation (Law No. 9643/2016) regulates already the Negotiation Procedure and Limited Procedure quite well, which could already provide for fast, efficient, and useful purchases, without any need for secret operations. These two procedures, already provided for by the national Legislation, do guarantee the possibility for supplies in situations of emergencies and disasters, guaranteeing Proportionality.
  • On the other hand, all the elements of a contract, such as the scope of purchase; process; characteristics and specifications of goods or services to be purchased, would not be subject to any Publication; Transparency; and Accountability for purposes of Ensuring Trust and Public Oversight, given that they are going to be secret.
  • Violation of the Principle of Open and Transparent Governance. The Albanian Government is avoiding the principle of Open Government, and this happens at a time when the Reformed Legislation in the Area of Contracting in several European countries, and not only, requires all contracts made in cases of emergency to be fully published as open data. This is to recall that since 2009, Albania is part of the Open Government Partnership, taking a special commitment in the context of Procurement Sector, not yet fulfilled.
  • Classification of these contracts (procedures) as secret because of the essential interest of the state falls against even the Normative Act of the Government on Announcement of Situation of Natural Disaster itself, an act which contains no provisions restricting the Constitutional Right to Information (Article 23 of the Constitution).

 

Our organization considers these acts of the Government as anti-constitutional, illegal, unjustified, and in contradiction with the basic principle of good governance, i.e. Accountability and Transparency. Direct Negotiation (Article 33 of the Procurement Law) and the Request according to the Limited Procedure (Article 31 of the Procurement Law) are sufficient to guarantee fast, efficient, and intelligent Contracting and Procurement, and proportional to the Essential Interests of the People of a State.

 

AIS joins the Open Contracting Partnership Recommendations for Governance, recommendations for Purchases in the situations created by Covid-19, for Fast, Smart and Transparent Purchases (Open) https://www.open-contracting.org/what-is-open-contracting/covid19/

Treasury transactions; how and how much are being paid by the budgetary institutions for their bills;

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Every Treasury Transactions made by our budgetary institutions, be it common or emergency payments. The Treasury Transactions is a well-structured database containing data about every payment made by budgetary institutions. The data catalogue has information on any transaction from 2012 and onwards. In addition, using search engines and communication filters, you may access information about payments made by institutions, by categories of expenses, and beneficiaries, according to the payment amount. We will continue updating our information every Friday. Access here

Kursori.org, an e-learning platform, in quarantine empowering itself for a well-paid and online labor market.

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Our most useful database in times of quarantine Kursori.org .The ODK and AIS have applied in the last two years an e-Learning platform for enabling young people to develop their digital skills, a program that enables training on skills for an innovative market of Information Technology. The database is designed to assist students in Kosovo and the high school students of Lezha and Kurbin, Albania, to develop for a safe job market. From today, our e-Learning platform Kursori is open to everyone. Young people and anyone else may obtain three levels of skills to develop their capacity, so they can make the most of it to benefit the most and not waste their time while in quarantine. Kursori.Org is supported by the European Delegation as an activity of the Open ICT Education for Youth Employability Project and is financed by an EU IPA cross–border project. The objective of the project is to foster youth employability providing open access to critical ICT knowledge and skills, and strengthening cross–border cooperation between the educational institutions. In times of quarantine, this is a useful tool for professional training and development that allows you to work from home. We are opening this platform for everyone, it’s in Albanian. Click, register and become skilled. A great team of Tech Leaders is there to assist you.

What the Health Sector is procuring includes small purchases for the safety of the regional doctors;

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What are our Health institutions purchasing through negotiations for emergencies or through common purchasing procedures? We have a track record of all the public health sector investments and purchases. In the past two weeks, a few purchases have been recorded for the reinforcement of hygienic protection for health buildings. Link health tenders
Other transparent procurements for the following institutions are being updated with accessible and well-structured documents on our databases:
Tenders for Local Government Units: Open Procurement Municipality and subordinate institutions. Link
Tenders of the Central Purchasing Agency, purchases for executive institutions Link
Transparent procurements by the Albanian Road Authority, tenders for infrastructure Link
Tenders by state-owned companies (SOCs) buying, the major suppliers of massive services, such as drinking water, electricity, etc. Link

Tender for the Reconstruction Program for the State-Supported Share

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Open Procurement Albania publishes information for procurement procedures worth of 9.4 billion Albanian Lek (76,42 million Euros) for Homes and Schools damaged by the Earthquake. The Government opts for Limited Procedure, avoiding open bidding competition. The 20-days timeframe for submission of requests by interested competitors is not respected.

Data, documents, and information on every stage of such procedures can be easily accessed in our database for transparent procurement: http://www.openprocurement.al/sq/albaniandf/list

The Albanian government through the Albanian Development Fund has announced contractions worth 900410 141 (nine billion and four hundred million and ten thousand and one hundred and forty-one Albanian Lek). Equivalent to 76,42 million Euros). Purpose of tender: Construction of Homes and Schools in the regions affected by the Earthquake (November 2019) The financing is from the state budget. The procedure applied is the limited procedure (not open). This procedure requires interested parties to submit a request to the authority, and then the authority selects the bidders based on the eligibility criteria, and not on the bids they have submitted. The selected companies or operators are then notified of their selection and asked to submit their bids to the authority, which selects the best bid. This non-open procedure is envisioned by the Law on Public Procurement (Law No. 9643, Article 31). The law requires such procedures to be used only when it is necessary to make a difference between the selection phase, where candidates are qualified/disqualified, and the phase of deciding who the winning operator is following a review of their bids. The Limited Procedure is to apply in specific cases and requires legal arguments. With the bidders already known (through the selection phase), the process is more likely to present risks for the competition and efficiency compared with the Open Procedure. The contracting authority would have to carefully argue why it opted for this procedure. Such arguments are not found in the information made available for the public regarding the tender documents, or in any reports by the Albanian Development Fund.

The list of procedures published on 10 and 11 March includes:

  1. Reconstruction of individual houses in areas affected by the earthquake. As part of the reconstruction process. Reference of this procedure REF – 53475-03-09-2020 with a fund limit of 5 525 192 288 (five billion and two hundred and twenty-five million and one hundred and ninety-two thousand and eighty-eight Albanian Lek). The scope of the Framework Agreement includes the reconstruction of individual houses as per the model projects (1+1, 1+2, 1+3) in the territory of Durrës, Kamza, Kavajë, Rrogozhinë, Krujë, Kurbin, and Lezha municipalities. Mirdita, Shijak, and Vorë. According to the Standard Document, the house reconstruction can be done as a group or separately on the site of existing houses, as designated by the mandatory local plans. The procuring authority is the Albanian Development Fund. The interested parties are only given nine calendar days (not working days) to submit their bids. Based on Law No. 9643 and No. 34, and Decision No. 914 of the Council of Ministers, the time available for bidders to submit their tenders is 20 days, which is a criterion that the Authority has not met, putting the procedure at risk. The tender submission deadline is set in contradiction with the 20-days deadline. On this procurement passport, under Open Procurement Albania, you will find the documents accessible for the public. LINK http://openprocurement.al/sq/albaniandf/view/id/293
  2. Equally, a Lot Procedure was announced on March 17th for a total fund limit of 4,175,217,853 (four billion and one hundred and seventy-five million and two hundred and seventeen thousand and eight hundred and fifty-three) Albanian Lek without VAT. The budget available for 2020 is 1,043,804,463 Albanian Lek without VAT. Lots include:
  3. Lot 1. Reconstruction of schools in areas affected by the earthquake funded by the Reconstruction Fund through the budget approved by Decision No. 212, dated 11. 03. 2020 on The use of the Reconstruction Fund to fund reconstruction of schools. The fund limit without VAT is 511 405 370 Albanian Lek (without VAT). http://openprocurement.al/sq/albaniandf/view/id/297
  4. Lot 2. Reconstruction of schools in Kavaja Municipality for an amount of 490 413 615 Albanian Lek without VAT. The buildings to be reconstructed under Lot 2 include the 9-year elementary school “Selman Daci”, the 9-year elementary school “Ramazan Jangozi”, the 9-year elementary school “Kastriot Derveni”, the 9-year elementary school “Gjon Luka” in Luz village, which cover all a surface of approximately 10 691 m2. The tender was announced on 17th of March, while the deadline for the submission of bids is 27th of March. LINK http://openprocurement.al/sq/albaniandf/view/id/298
  5. Lot 3. The Reconstruction of Schools in Durres Municipality consists of 845 723 696 Albanian Lek without VAT. The schools included in Lot 3 are: the 9-year elementary school and the kindergarten “Bedrie Beziqi”, kindergarten “Met Hasa”, the 9- year elementary school “Neim Babameto”, the 9-year elementary school “Qemal Mici, the 9-year elementary school “Hasan Koci” with a total construction surface of approximately 18 438 m2. Linku http://openprocurement.al/sq/albaniandf/view/id/299
  6. Lot 4. The Reconstruction of Schools in Durres Municipality 2, value 850 692 969 Albanian Lek. The schools to be reconstructed under Lot 4 include “Shaqe Mazreku” School, the United High School “Rexhep Mezini”, the 9-year elementary school and kindergarten “Adem Gjeli”, 9-year elementary school “Xhelal Shtufi Shkafanaj”, 9-year elementary school “Njazi Mastori 2+3”, pre-elementary school and kindergarten, 9-year elementary school “Haradinaj Brothers” with a total construction surface of all buildings of approximately 18 545 m2. LINK http://openprocurement.al/sq/albaniandf/view/id/300
  7. Lot 5. The reconstruction of schools in Kavaja Municipality and Rogozhina for 414 766 205 Albanian Lek without VAT. The schools to be reconstructed under Lot 5 include: the vocational school “Charles Teleford Erickson”, “26 Marsi” vocational school, the dormitory in Golem, the 9-year elementary school in Gose village, the pre-elementary school and kindergarten in Vile Bashtove, which cover all a construction surface of approximately 9041 m2. http://openprocurement.al/sq/albaniandf/view/id/301
  8. Lot 6. The reconstruction of schools, Kamëz Municipality, value 621 757 340 Albanian Lek without VAT. The schools to be built under Lot 6 include the 9-year elementary school “Halil Coka”, the secondary school “Sulejman Elezi”, the kindergarten “Niko Hoxha”, the kindergarten “Lidhja e Prizrenit” in Paskuqan, the kindergarten “Halit Coka”, which cover all a total surface of approximately 13 555 m2. Link http://openprocurement.al/sq/albaniandf/view/id/302
  9. Lot 7. The reconstruction of schools in the municipality of Shijak for an amount of 440 458 658 Albanian Lek without VAT. The schools covered by lot 7 are: the 9-year elementary school Ramadan Subashi, 9-year elementary school Ahmetaq, Kindergarten in “Kodër Bërxullë”, “Marqinet” Kindergarten, “Lidhja e Prizrenit” Elementary School, “16 Shtatori” High School, Kindergarten number 1, “Vlashaj” Kindergarten, “Kajo Karafili” High School with total construction are of all schools approximately 92602 m2. http://openprocurement.al/sq/albaniandf/view/id/303

Dear friends, we wish you are well and safe in these difficult weeks of Covid 19 pandemic. Our staff is teleworking since the 10th of March. Each of us is safely working from home, being in online communication with each other, our collaborators, and targets groups. In these difficult days we continue to disclose data, ensure transparency and assess risks related with payment and public contracting to strengthen information, transparency and accountability. Our motto: Follow Taxpayers’ Money

Kërkesë për Informim mbi masa kapacitete import terapi intensive Covid 19

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Together for Life (OJF) dhe Instituti Shqiptar i Shkencave / Open Data Albania OJF i kanë drejtuar një kërkesë për Informim, mbi masa kapacitete import terapi intensive Covid 19, Ministrisë së Shëndetësisë.

Kërkesën e plotë për Informim e gjeni Këtu

Super tenders in times of epidemics. The Albanian Government allocates 9.4 billion Albanian leks (about 76.42 Million Euros) to Post-Earthquake Reconstruction following the November 2019 Earthquake.

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Tender and Procurement in times of epidemics. The Albanian Government has not stopped its usual procurement procedures. The post-earthquake reconstruction program has just begun tendering in March. Open Procurement Albania publishes procurements, worth a total fund limit of 9.4 billion Albanian leks (without VAT) for houses and schools, which were damaged by the earthquake. The Government opts for “limited procedure”, avoiding open bidding competition. Based on Law No. 9643/2006 article No. 34, and Decision No. 914/2014 of the Council of Ministers, the time available for bidders to submit their tenders is 20 days, which is a criterion that the Authority has not met, putting the procedure at risk. The tender submission deadline is set in contradiction with the 20-days deadline. The procurement was announced on March 10th, the deadline for document submission was March 19th, i.e. nine calendar days only. The list The list of tenders is updated on our web-database for public procurement procedures conducted by the Albanian Development Fund.

Open Corporations Albania, business data in the country, database audience grows

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The Open Corporates Albania website, which provides information of an economic nature, in the Albanian language, reaches a record number of clicks. Over 20 thousand unique users every month, i.e. 40% more than last year, Open Corporates Albania has resulted to be a favorable website for the information it provides for business companies contracted by public institutions. In January 2020, according to Google Analytics, the website reached a total of 32899 unique users and 1 million page views. Although 90% of the information is only available in the Albanian language, the website is also clicked in other countries as well. Thus, 78.4 % of the clicks come from Albania; 4.2% from neighboring Italy, third comes USA with 3.4% of the clicks, followed by Kosovo, Germany, United Kingdom, the Netherlands, Greece, Turkey, and France. Currently, the website is being maintained and updated with data by AIS team, a non-governmental organization promoting Open Data in Albania

Open Data promotes investigative journalism, facts about fraud through tenders

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1 in 3 tenders without fair competition, open data encourage investigative journalism to denounce corruption with taxpayers’ money On January 7th, the TopStory investigative show on Top Channel denounced forms of fraud through public procurement tenders. Shocking facts were brought to the program for one in every three tenders without fair competition. 300 million euros of taxpayers’ money results to be lost every year, abused and misappropriated through tenders with clientelist elements. AIS, an organization promoting Open Data in Albania, contributed to this courageous TV investigation through data released: Specifically: Data about tenders and contracts with problems regarding competition published on the Open Procurement Albania portal; information about clientelist companies published in the Open Corporates Albania portal, and data on the payments from the State Budget published on Spending Data Albania . For the last four years, AIS has been publishing data and assessing the risk of irregularities in tenders, known as RedFlag procurement, identifying information and gaps for every tender held by municipalities ; Albanian Development Fund ; Albanian Road Authority ; Health Sector; Central Purchasing Agency; Public-Owned Agency;