Author: Dallandyshe Xhaferri
Municipalities are spending more and more money on "year-end holidays". The lack of competition and maintenance of decorations increases expenses through tenders, where the winners are either alone in the competition or win with the "limit fund".
On the eve of the end of the year, "Sinjalizo" monitored the expenses of four of the municipalities in the country for the purchase of holiday decorations. This year the municipalities of Tirana, Korça, Elbasan and Durrës have together invested over 70 million new lek in the lighting of the Christmas and New Year lights, but the tenders are accompanied by "red flags" due to the lack of competition. Investments in the beautification of cities have multiplied over the last 3 years, while the offers of the companies participating in the tenders are close to the limit of the funds provided by the municipalities.
Korça triples the expenses for end of year
This year, the municipality of Korça has more than tripled the expenses for the festive decoration of the city for the Christmas and New Year holidays. According to the response to the request for information, the municipality planned to spend over 15 million lek on the decoration of the city, but unlike two years ago, the capital of the Southeast has not been supported by any private sponsor for turning on the "lights" at the end of the year.
The Municipality of Korça tells "Sinjalizo" that the decoration of the city for the end of last year cost over 4.6 million ALL, an amount close to 2021 where the decoration of the city was 4.4 million ALL.
"All the elements related to the end of the year celebrations, from the decor to the festive calendar, for Korça are and are always growing. Thus, the decorations unlike other cities that have only one pole, Korça has them spread almost in all parts of the city, and in the parts frequented by locals and visitors",- says for "Sinjalizo" the Vice-Mayor of Korçë Municipality, Belina Themeli.
Pano Soko, an economic expert, tells "Sinjalizo" that the problems associated with tenders for year-end decorations are related to the lack of competition among operators and the low budget of tenders, compared to other sectors.
"Since these tenders are small numbers, they are beyond the attention of the relevant institutions, whether within the institutions that organize these, such as the internal audit, or other institutions of control and law enforcement, as may be The Supreme State Control or other institutions", - says Soko, adding the lack of competition as a result of the lack of local operators who deal with organizing events and beautifying cities.
But according to the public data of Open Procurement Albanian, in the last three years the tenders opened by the municipality of Korçë for the decoration of the city have been accompanied by "red flags" showing problems in the tendering process.
This year, the municipality of Korçë opened the tender worth 5.9 million ALL for purchase of decorative strips with lights, but there were only two providers in the race. The winner was the operator "Selvije Abasllari" with the offer of 5.6 million ALL. According to the official explanation, the other competing operator did not meet the criteria special qualification requirement, although the winner's declaration document states: "The economic operator has presented the material samples, but they are not according to the technical specifications described in this criterion".
At the end of 2022, the same economic operator has won without competition the tender with a limited fund of 1 ALL for the installations of the end of the year holidays (decorative spruce of the end of the year holidays). The value of the tender with the same description has tripled this year, reaching the value of 110 ALL.
Another tender accompanied by a red flag is the one for the purchase of festive decorations. Korçë Municipality opened the tender with the limit value of 4 ALL in November of this year, but this tender was won by the economic operator with the value of 583 without VAT. Within the 333-day deadline, 4 economic operators participated in the competition, of which only the "FALGEO" operator was declared the winner, while an explanation was given for the loss of the competition for only one of the operators, although the process was accompanied without complaints.
Even in 2022, Korçë municipality has opened the tender with the limit fund of 2 916 580 ALL for the purchase of festive decorations and it turns out that it was won without competition by the operator "Selvije Abasllari". Also, in 2021, the municipality of Korçë has opened the tender with the same description, for festive decorations, with a limit value of 2 910 000 ALL, being won without competition by the economic operator "Iceberg Communication" LLC
According to these public data, during the period 2021-2023, the municipality of Korçë has spent over ALL 10.2 million only on holiday decorations through companies that won tenders.
Tirana, two tenders with red flags
The Municipality of Tirana this year has opened 3 tenders with a total value of 28.5 million ALL for the decoration of the capital for the end of the year holidays. Two of these tenders have been marked with "red flags" by the analytical filters of Open Procurement Albania.
In November of this year, the municipality opened the first tender with the limit fund of 9 million ALL, which has been qualified by the analytical filters of open data procurement with a "red flag" due to the lack of competition. This tender was won without competition by "SEZON DEKOR" with the winning value excluding VAT of 8 ALL. The second tender opened on November 471 of this year for Shopping Service Decorations for the New Year with the limit fund of 10 million lek, it was again won without competition by another operator, "Iceberg Communication shpk" with the offer of 9.9 million lek.
The almost annual tenders of the municipality of Tirana with a value of 2 million alleks or 2.9 million alleks per end of the year fireworks have been acquired from the period 2016-2021 by the same and only competing operator, "Alba Fire shpk".
Elbasan,a competing company
On November 6 of this year, the municipality of Elbasan hatched the tender with the limit fund of 12 ALL, for which the only contestant "SEZON DEKOR" was declared the winner with the offer of 493 ALL including VAT. In response to the request for information, this municipality tells "Sinjalizo" that there were no sponsorships from private businesses for the decoration of the city.
Last year, the Elbasan Municipality budgeted the investment of 520 lek for the maintenance of the year-end decorations previously used in 000 and 2021. In 2020, the Elbasan Municipality, two weeks after the November 2019 earthquake, announced the winner of tender worth 26 13 400 ALL for the decoration of the city, while the Albanian municipalities in Kosovo and North Macedonia, such as: Prizren, Mitrovica and Tetova did not invest in the decoration of the cities so that the estimated monetary values would help them as donations to the inhabitants affected by the earthquake in Albania.
Durrës, a competitor in three years
The municipality of Durrës has also recognized an increase in investment in the decoration of the city from year to year. In the three tenders opened by this municipality at the end of 2020, 2022 and 2023, there was only one competing economic operator, automatically the winner.
In 2020 "Iceberg Communication" won the tender with the offer of 9 905 200 without VAT for the decoration of the city, in 2022 the municipality announced the tender worth 9 780 000 alleks, while this year the tender went to the value of 12 350 000 alleks.
Artan Xhiani, an accounting expert for 26 years, tells "Sinjalizo" that in the tendering process, one of the biggest problems is the favoring of a certain entity.
"One of the methods to favor a certain entity is "adapting the ToR (Document of Terms of Reference) according to the characteristics of the entity that should win". In this way, the default entity enters at a higher price than the others because it is more likely to win, and wins the race almost with the maximum of the limit fund",-Xhian says.
"Another method is the disqualification of unwanted subjects with the argument "he did not present the right documents, or deficiencies in the documents". And what is unfair here, in my opinion, is the fact that sometimes entities that have a better technical and financial offer are disqualified", - says Xhian, adding,-"this way of behavior on the part of the contracting authorities has killed the fair competition, and the tenders end up in certain hands, and at worst, public works are performed by subjects who are not the best in that field".
Unlike Albania, in Kosovo some municipalities have managed to use the earliest framework contracts related to economic operators, which are still valid for this year. However, the economic journalist, Zikaj Shabani, says for "Sinjalizo" that the municipalities have spent from 3 thousand to 50 thousand euros for the decoration of the cities of Kosovo.
"Only the capital (Prishtina) has contracted 35 euros for the year-end decorations, according to the published announcement. The tender was awarded to the company "Finesë Design SH.PK", says Shabani.
Meanwhile, Pano Soko emphasizes that in Albania, due to the lack of maintenance of decorations, tenders for decoration are reopened year after year and this could be avoided by the local government
"Each municipality has its unfulfilled needs, which come from the fact that municipal budgets are in deficit. So, in terms of liability, Albanian municipalities are deficit, that's why we have this high number of municipal bankruptcies. Any opportunity to save funds would be extremely useful for all institutions, that is, for all municipalities", - concludes Soko, adding that the increase in the municipalities' deficit increases year after year and their dependence on the Government, since the latter meets the needs through central taxes.
*red flag: it is the note set for tenders with problems related to corruption and lack of competition
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