This year, the capital worked more actively to improve the sewage network in Podgorica. The start of the construction of a new collector and secondary sewage network was announced. The project was financed with money from the German KfW bank through two loans, worth 40 million euros.
KfW Bank's tender rules stipulate that contracts financed with the bank's money cannot be concluded with companies and persons who have been legally convicted of "participation in a criminal organization, money laundering, terrorism, child labor or white slave trade."
That "Vodovod" from Podgorica did not respect the terms of the loan from KfW Bank, but also the positive laws of Montenegro, is shown by the fact that in March of this year, a contract was signed with the Podgorica company "Toškovići" on the construction of a sewage network in Konik, worth 1,8 million euros.
At the time of signing the contract, the owner of the company, Ivica Tošković, was already legally convicted for the criminal offenses of creating a criminal organization and tax evasion, after the investigation in the "Vardar" case. Tošković was identified as a member of a criminal group that damaged the state budget for 3,7 million euros, and in the plea agreement concluded last year, he undertook to return 140.000 euros for which the prosecution charged him and pay a fine of 40.000 euros.
MANS is trying to get an answer to the question of how the contract with Tošković was concluded from the Capital City and "Vodovod", but no reply has been received to any of the emails sent since the end of July. The practice of ignoring all the more important and delicate topics that require a response from the public has culminated since Ivan Vuković took over as mayor.
In the meantime, the company "Toškovići" continued to implement the signed contract, which was confirmed by Vuković, during one of his visits to the construction site in Konik at the end of August.
However, the answer came from the German KfW bank, which was informed by the MANS Research Center that there had been a violation of the tender procedure, which was confirmed by the bank after internal checks.
"After analyzing the relevant documents, we came to the conclusion that this case is subject to sanctions. In this sense, we informed the contractor, "Vodovod i kanalizacije" Podgorica, that this contract cannot be financed from the funds of KfW Bank and the EU Investment Framework of the Western Balkans".
After this response from the bank, it is clear that "Vodovod" must terminate the contract with the company "Toškovići". It is also interesting that the Montenegrin competent authorities are not dealing with this case, since the domestic legislation expressly prohibits contracting business with persons legally convicted of criminal offenses with elements of corruption, money laundering and fraud.
How Vodovod plans to continue the implementation of the work is not yet known, because neither the company nor the Capital City have answered this question either.
On the other hand, MANS, during a tour of the field at the beginning of the week, established that the machines and workers of "Tošković" continued their work without any hindrance.
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