Concessions and public procurement contracts, under audit by KLSH within 2025

2023-10-09 09:19:00, Ekonomi CNA

Concessions and public procurement contracts within the year 2025 are expected to be audited by the State Supreme Audit Office (SSA) The government foresees that the audit of concessions and public procurement contracts will be carried out according to the audit guide that is expected to be approved by the State Supreme Audit Office within the year 2025.

The government's commitment to the control of concession contracts and tenders is presented in the document "Guidelines for the Rule of Law - Chapter 23 "Judiciary and fundamental rights" which includes the main measures that are expected to be taken within the framework of the findings presented by the European Commission for the process of negotiations for the country's membership in the EU.

For the prevention of corruption in the most vulnerable sector such as procurement, within 2024 the revision of the legislation on public procurement is also foreseen to guarantee greater accountability, traceability of the implementation of the given contract and the involvement of public officials in possible abuses.

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The priority remains to carry out a risk assessment in vulnerable sectors and approve a plan within 2025 to address the risk of integrity and corruption in sectors vulnerable to corruption (property, health, education, public procurement and PPPs, taxes and customs).

So several concession contracts expected to end this year have been postponed by the government.

The fiscal stamp concession contract that ended on February 6, 2023 was postponed for another 2 years. The contract ends in December 2024. While the new fee for operators of production and import of excise goods was reduced by 10%. In Albania, the tax stamp fee for 10 years was 22.4 USD per 1,000 pieces, while in Europe the average price of fiscal stamps is 3 USD per 1,000 pieces, in Kosovo 2.2 USD. Local entrepreneurs paid almost 8 times more compared to the average price of stamps in Europe.

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The Council of Ministers also postponed by one year the concession for marking fuels, which should have officially ended on August 1, despite the opposition from fuel companies due to the lack of efficiency of this concession so far and the lack of arguments why should it be postponed? The contract ends in March 2024.

The health concession contracts for Check up and Sterilization expire in 2024. For both of these contracts, SPAK has launched investigations into abuses. Investigations for the Check Up concession started in May 2022, while for sterilization in August 2023.

In the years 2021-2022 SPAK started the investigations for the incinerator of Elbasan and Fier. In August 2023, investigations also started for the Tirana incinerator. In total, 110 million euros were paid for the three contracts from the state budget./ Monitor