Amendments proposed to prevent deals in public procurement

TIRANA, Nov. 22 – The Competition Authority has suggested that the public procurement law must be amended in order to prevent possible prohibited agreements among companies participating in tenders to provide public services. In some recommendations sent to the Public Procurement Agency, government and Parliament, the Competition suggests that article 13 of the law approved in November 2006, which foresees a 1 to 3 year-ban in procurement procedures for economic operators, should be amended by adding ‘for the cases when under a decision by the Competition Commission, the existence of an agreement in bids among economic operators participating in procurement procedures has been discovered.”
The Authority also recommends that the legal framework should foresee that Contracting Authorities must notify the Competition Authority in cases they identify signs of prohibited agreement in public procurement procedures.
The Public Procurement Agency has also been recommended to draft guidelines on the fighting and discovering secret deals.
According to the Competition Authority, these kinds of public procurement agreements which are banned in all OECD countries, affect taxpayers, lower public confidence in a competitive process and benefits from a competitive market.
The decision made earlier this month, came after the Competition Authority identified some abuses in some investigations carried out into the public procurement of new cars.
The changes are first of all aimed at raising awareness among companies to prevent prohibited agreements in public procurements and clarify the officials’ role in case of identifying abuse case.
Deals in public procurement cases take place when participating bidders secretly agree to increase prices, share markets or lower the quality of goods and services for consumers.
Half of the economic operators using Albania’s Electronic Procurement System (EPS) say they need further training on using EPS, despite the procedure being compulsory since January 2009, according to findings of a survey published by the American Chamber of Commerce in Albania.
Under the government decision mandating that starting January 1, 2009, all public institutions should issue procurements only through EPS, thus eliminating the use of paper-based procurement procedures, Albania became the first country in the world to implement a 100% electronic procurement system for all public sector procurements above the threshold of 3,000 Euro.
The achievement was internationally recognized when on June 23rd, 2010, PPA received the 2nd place (behind Germany) in the Public Service Awards Program, among public organizations from fifteen countries recognized for excellence in public service by the United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs.