Prague, Aug 8 (CTK) – Up to ten ministers are to buy cars together within a giant contract in order to save finances and eliminate possible corruption, which will be the biggest central purchase in history of the Czech Republic, daily Lidove noviny (LN) writes today.
The ministries want to buy 1431 cars for themselves and subordinated organisations, 130 offices in total, in 2018 and 2019. The overall price is estimated at more than 800 million crowns.
It is unprecedented that so many ministries are able to agree on a joint purchase regardless of which party their heads represent, LN adds.
“All ten sectors have approved the contract documentation, now the approval process before putting up the tender is underway within the Finance Ministry as the central contracting authority. We will put up the tender in September at the latest,” Deputy Finance Minister Tomas Vyhnanek, who is in charge of the “super- tender,” told LN.
Only the interior, agriculture, foreign and labour and social affairs ministries will not participate in the joint purchase since they have been negotiating on their own contracts on cars or they have car supplies secured for these years already. They intent to joint the central purchase after these contracts expire, LN adds.
Within the super-tender, cars will be supplied to the ministries of finance, transport, defence, industry and trade, justice, culture, education, health, environment and regional development, LN says.
The order is divided into eight parts. The Finance Ministry will sign a framework contract with the tender winner, while the individual sectors will sign particular contracts on car supplies based on their needs, LN says.
LN also writes that such a joint contract will prevent any preferential treatment in a tender, which happened in the past.
It points to the case of the State Office for Nuclear Safety (SUJB) preparing requirements for new cars that only the Skoda car maker could meet. The office admitted to have done so intentionally since it is used to Skoda cars, LN reported last week.
The state administration is said to prefer Skoda, seated in Mlada Boleslav, central Bohemia, in car tenders in general. However, if such a tender is prepared by many offices together, this considerably limits the possibility to tailor-make conditions for one and only supplier, LN writes.
($1=22.135 crowns)
