In 2011 MANS continued to support more transparent and accountable public procurement in Montenegro, both by monitoring work of responsible institutions and investigating concrete cases of corruption and organized crime in this area.
We continued to collect decisions on awarding public contracts, creating a database that now counts information on over 9000 individual contracts. This amount of data enable us monitor performance of institutions in charge for control of public procurement processes and to identify and report law violations.
In 2011, special focus was given to contracts on public works, having in mind large amounts of funds invested in infrastructure and other similar works. Last year we gathered detailed information on over 150 contracts for public works and supporting documents and publish then at separate page of our website .
This information enabled us to investigate contract awarding procedure, but also later contract implementation in terms of meeting deadlines and enforcing penalty provisions when contracts are violated.
In that light, we investigated a case of contract for constructing an apartment building signed between National Post Office of Montenegro and construction company “ZIB”, majority owned by Mayor of Bar municipality. Analyzing this case we discovered that mentioned company broke the deadline without any penalty, that Mayor abused his position to change a spatial plan in order to accommodate a bigger building, and that construction started without valid permits.
Another case involving Bar municipality was related to contract for construction of overpass signed with construction company “Bemax”. Investigating this case, MANS discovered that contract was granted to this company despite the fact that their offer was not most favorable one. In addition to that, by monitoring enforcement of such contract we discovered that company violated completion deadline, while no penalty was imposed in accordance with the contract.
Finally, the overpass was delivered months after deadline and opened for traffic without valid usage permit. For both of the mentioned cases MANS submitted criminal appeals against responsible public officers to State Prosecutor.
Analyzing contract awarding MANS discovered several cases where Commission for the Control of Public Procurement failed to perform their primary duty – protect public interest and tax payers money in public procurement. Instead of that, this institution openly favorized particular companies when deciding on certain public procurements.
Gathering additional information on these cases, MANS managed to compile three individual criminal appeals against members of the Commission for abuse of office and suspected corruptive behavior. Criminal appeals were also submitted against companies’ representatives for abuse of commercial powers.
