The new Law on Public Procurement is a "wind at the back" of corruption and secret agreements to rig tenders, Ines Mrdović, legal advisor of the NGO "Action for Social Justice", assessed for "Vijesti".
Of the essential news, the Ministry of Finance, however, previously pointed out that it is a matter of harmonizing with European directives and conducting complete electronic communication in the public procurement system.
The law was adopted at the end of last year and will begin to be applied on July 7, it was confirmed by "News" in the Ministry of Finance.
Last year, public procurements reached the amount of 609 million euros and accounted for more than 12 percent of GDP.
"Without appropriate and high-quality control mechanisms, in a country marked by a hybrid system and suitable for abuses, the new Law on Public Procurement is a 'wind at the back' of corruption and secret agreements to rig tenders," Mrdović told "Vijesti".
The current Law provides for the announcement of tenders for the purchase of goods and services worth at least 15.000 euros and the execution of works of at least 30.000 euros, including VAT.
The law adopted by the Government after a rather non-transparent procedure and open objections from the NGO sector brings a number of novelties, one of the main ones being that the advertisement of an open procedure, i.e. a tender, will be mandatory for the purchase of goods and services worth more than 20.000 euros (excluding VAT ) and for the execution of works worth more than 40.000 euros (without VAT).
The State Commission for the Control of Public Procurement Procedures will in the future be called the Commission for the Protection of Rights in Public Procurement Procedures, or for short the Commission for the Protection of Rights.
"The new Public Procurement Law introduces numerous novelties in the field of public procurement, and for its high-quality and efficient implementation, exceptional commitment is required from all those obliged to implement it, i.e. orderers and bidders," said Zoran Živković, president of the State Commission, to "Vijesta".
Mrdović pointed out that the new law provides for the first time that the basic contract can be increased by 20 percent with an annex.
"Although this solution is in line with European directives, our system is sensitive to abuses, which should have been taken into account when adopting the Law, and not 'blindly' copy European solutions. This way, the provision leaves a lot of room for millions of euros of our money to flow into private coffers," she said.
For the first time, the new Law introduces a competitive procedure with negotiations, which is carried out through two phases. Among other things, it can be initiated for specific procurements, what are the innovative solutions or when the client cannot determine the technical specifications, or all the offers were incorrect, so the client decides in the second phase with whom to continue negotiations.
"This is a great danger of rigging the tender and circumventing the law and should be an exceptional possibility, and the control of the contracting parties is also unclear. From the application of the Law, for the first time, the tasks of creating and adopting planning documents regulating spatial planning are exempted. A significant part of the planning documents in the country is done by the Institute for Urban Planning and Design, where the majority of the ownership is held by (Aco Đukanović) the brother of the Montenegrin president. European directives do not prescribe this exception, and when you take into account that the state does not even have a valid Spatial Plan at the moment, and that there are numerous locations that need to be planned, this is obviously a way to avoid the public procurement procedure and deals are negotiated directly," she said. is Mrdovic.
She states that one of the bad solutions is that the documentation on public procurement will be kept for only four years, after which it can be destroyed. That deadline, he points out, had to be significantly longer, because the destruction of documentation also means the destruction of evidence of potential abuses.
Živković explained that the only facilitating circumstance of the work of the future Commission for the Protection of Rights is that the new PPL has extended the deadline for deciding on appeals, i.e. it is stipulated that the Commission is obliged to decide on the appeal within 30 days, after the submission of complete files, with the possibility that deadline be extended by 10 days in the case of the need to hire an expert, obtain files from the competent authorities or the volume of the case files.
The current PPL, which is in force until July 7, provides for a decision-making period of 15 days, with the possibility of an extension of 10 days for the aforementioned reasons. "The relief is that the members of the Commission will have more time to study the appeal and case files, and thus to prepare for a better decision," Živković concluded.
Parliamentary parties are exempt, although they receive money from the budget
Mrdović stated that for the first time, "other users of funds" from the central and local budgets and other public revenues were exempted from being liable for the application of the Law.
"In practice, this opens up space for parliamentary political parties, which receive funds from the budget, not to use the public procurement system".
Earlier, the PPL stipulated that the taxpayers were, among other things, beneficiaries of the budget of Montenegro, that is, the budget of the local self-government unit and other public revenues. That part is not in the new PPL.
"The provisions of Article 14 of the aforementioned Law establish exemptions for the procurement of specific items. In that part, in accordance with the practice of EU member states and strictly based on the provision of Article 10 paragraph 1 point (j) 32014L0024 of Directive 2014/24/EU on public procurement, exemption from application is provided. of the Act for: services of political campaigns, covered by the codes of the unified dictionary of public procurements 9341400-0, 92111230-3 and 92111240-6, if they are procured by a political party as part of an election campaign", stated the Ministry of Finance.
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