When a Montenegrin citizen graduated from university in Montenegro, he never imagined that he would have to prove his knowledge of his native language to get a job.
The situation becomes even more absurd when you consider that it was legally impossible to obtain such proof from licensed institutions, despite the explicit request of the Institution of Blood Transfusion of Montenegro, where he sought employment. Namely, a certificate of knowledge of the Montenegrin language can only be issued to foreign nationals, which S.T. certainly is not.
How did an absurd provision find its way into a law, creating unnecessary administrative barriers while leaving a public institution without the necessary staff? Find out in our video story.
The video stories were created within the project “Strengthening Demand for Merit Based Recruitment: Roadmap to Meritocracy”, which Institute Alternative is implementing with the support of the British Embassy in Podgorica. The content is the sole responsibility of Institute Alternative and does not necessarily reflect the views of the donors.
Simple procurements are exempted from the application of the Law on Public Procurements, and the Rulebook that regulates this type of procurements additionally exempts direct procurements, so no sanctions are provided for illegalities related to conflicts of interest or other irregularities, such as the sharing of procurement items.
Responses to the initiatives for inspection supervision by Institute Alternative point to legal gaps that hinder the effectiveness of inspection supervision in relation to potential conflicts of interest and other irregularities in direct public procurement. Therefore, there is no room for punishment by the inspection authorities.
Direct procurement is a special type of procurement of up to 8,000 euros, which allows the direct conclusion of invoices/contracts, which is the least transparent procedure, because it allows the deal to be concluded with whomever the client wants.
From year to year, consumption directly increases, so in 2023 it amounted to nearly 65 million euros.
Institute Alternative analyzed spending through direct procurement for previous years, which pointed to numerous irregularities in the use of this mechanism. Some of them are that individual procurements exceed the prescribed threshold on an annual level, that there is a sharing of public procurement items, as well as conflicts of interest.
The Ministry of Finance says that simple procurements are part of the public procurement system, to which they paid special attention in the previous period, and especially to the protection of the rights of participants in procedures through requests for monitoring. “Inspection control has the authority to act in accordance with the Rulebook and to take certain measures according to inspection supervision,” says Jelena Jovetić, general director of the Directorate for Public Procurement Policy.
The Inspectorate for Public Procurement states that we have an increase in identified irregularities related to simple procurements, but that the amendments to the Law on Public Procurement deleted the provision on the basis of which they could initiate misdemeanor proceedings and issue a misdemeanor order for identified irregularities.
They determine a conflict of interest only over 8,000 euros
According to the current legislation, the representative of the contracting authority and the bidders are required to prepare a statement on the absence of conflicts of interest for all procurements that are carried out through the electronic public procurement system, except for direct procurements where you choose from whom you will procure something and at what price. Although apparently it is about “small amounts”, since there is a limit that these procurements can be worth up to 8,000 on an annual level, it is problematic that most of the procurers misinterpret the law, so they observe this threshold for only one procurement without caring about the total amount on an annual basis.
Research conducted by IA on a sample of ministries, municipalities and individual public companies showed that individual purchasers allocated more than 40,000 euros for the same procurement item on an annual basis. Exceeding the amount for direct procurement as a frequent irregularity was confirmed by the recently completed audit of the regularity of these procurements conducted by the State Audit Institution (SAI).
Institute Alternative, analyzing consumption for 2022 using a direct agreement, determined that the Municipality of Andrijevica made purchases in this way from a company owned by the President of the Municipality Željko Ćulafić.
At the moment when the media became interested in this story, Ćulafić did not want to comment on those allegations, while the municipal Secretariat for public procurement said “it is not about a conflict of interest, but about pure, local patriotism”.
Because of all this, Institute Alternative sent an initiative to the Administration for Inspection Affairs at the end of December last year, asking it to carry out inspection supervision in the Municipality of Andrijevica, and determine the possible existence of a conflict of interest. In the response of the public procurement inspection, it is stated that it was determined that invoices were directly accepted from this supplier during 2022 and 2023, in the amount of 9.5 thousand euros without VAT.
Although the allegations from the initiative were confirmed, the response of the Administration for Inspection Affairs states that irregularities were not established because the provisions on the absence of conflicts of interest are prescribed only for procurements over 8,000 euros.
In the Ministry of Finance, they are aware of some legal restrictions, as they say, they believe that we always have certain examples where we can talk about abuse of the system and what is not regulated precisely enough by certain acts. Acknowledging that the by-law provides a certain width, even acting when they receive a certain suggestion, it can enable them to simultaneously approach changes in the law.
“However, when we talk about the conflict of interest, it is not only a subject of regulation in the area of public procurement. It is a broader concept that implies a conflict of interest for public contractors and for the public sector in general. So it is a systemically broader issue, but in the part that refers to public procurement policy, it is quite certain that the Ministry of Finance will always approach it when there is space and certain suggestions,” Jovetić pointed out.
Referring to the case of Andrijevica, Chief Inspector for Public Procurement Ivan Milićević pointed out that the Law on Public Procurement does not prescribe measures to prevent conflicts of interest in procurements made by direct acceptance of the invoice.
“I was a member of the Working group for changes to the Law.” It honestly never occurred to me that this kind of situation could happen. I also believe it is the same for the other members of the Working group. But I also believe that the Ministry will prescribe some measures to prevent this kind of behavior in the coming period,” Milićević is optimistic.
They break the Law, but there is no basis for punishment anymore
Some violations that are recognized by Law when it comes to irregularities in the implementation of public procurement through electronic public procurement system, do not apply to direct procurement, although they do occur. Such an offense is the division of public procurement items, in order to avoid the application of the law.
Here, as an example, we cite the Municipality of Mojkovac, which with a construction company during 2022 realized the adaptation of offices through three invoices. Although it is a corridor and offices located in the same building, the Municipality implemented the adaptation based on three invoices and thus directly chose the contractor, instead of publishing a public call for a simple procurement that would allow a larger number of interested companies to apply. The amount of the mentioned works without VAT is EUR 8,980, paid through three invoices on the same day, December 28, 2022.
The inspection confirmed the allegations from the initiative of Institute Alternative, that the Municipality of Mojkovac violated the article of the Rulebook on the way of conducting simple procurements, which states that simple procurements, i.e. works with an estimated value equal to or greater than 8 thousand euros, initiates the publication of requests for the submission of offers on the electronic system of public procurement, which was not done.
The inspection showed that the Law on Public Procurement, which was in force at that time and prescribed a minor offense if ordinary procurements are not carried out in accordance with the Rulebook that regulates them, was thus violated.
However, the bottom line is that in this particular case, it was about the division of public procurement items in order to avoid the appropriate procedure. The Law provides for a fine for this offense in the amount of 2,000 to 10,000 euros, if it is committed by a legal entity.
Although it is a violation of the Law on Public Procurement and the President of the Municipality, Vesko Delić himself, admitted that he awarded the work to the same construction company and thus avoided conducting the procedure through transparent procedures, he cannot be punished on that basis, since the Law does not apply to simple procurement. Because of the exemption from the Law, the only basis for misdemeanor liability for irregularities in connection with simple procurement was non-compliance with the Rulebook. Also, since in this particular case it is a legal entity of the municipality that cannot be fined, the inspection fined the responsible person in the local self-government body with a minimum fine of 150 euros. The Law previously provided for a fine of 150 to 1000 euros for the person responsible for this offense. In the meantime, the offense related to non-compliance with the Rulebook was removed from the Law, which also lost the basis for the inspection to punish irregularities related to simple procurement.
Public procurement inspector Ivan Milićević notes that in the part of control of simple procurements, it happens that procurements that are carried out by direct acceptance of invoices are not entered in the records kept by the ordering parties on the electronic public procurement system or are not entered in the records kept by the ordering parties on the electronic public procurement system or are not entered correctly.
“This makes it difficult for us to determine other irregularities such as the division of public procurement items or the implementation of simple procurements through the electronic public procurement system when the amount of 8,000 euros is reached by direct acceptance of the invoice and from when procurements should be carried out through the electronic public procurement system,” says Milićević.
The Ministry of Finance says that it is very important for them to ensure a transparent public procurement system and for public procurement to be efficient, but that they are committed to controlling simple procurements, which currently account for around 10% of total procurements.
“When we saw that the percentage of simple procurements significantly participates in the total value of public procurements, we introduced a limit through the rulebook on simple procurements, so that in one fiscal year, the contracting authorities can carry out one hundred thousand euros of the value of these procurements related to direct negotiations. So that we would ensure that in this segment as many business entities as possible participate in procurement and that direct, i.e. invoiced procurement is reduced to a minimum,” concluded Jovetić.
This article was produced as the part of the project Inspect to Protect_ Turning Inspectorates into Anti-Corruption Allies supported by the Embassy of the United States in Montenegro, the State Department’s Bureau for International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs (INL).
Corruption in public procurement represents the area of greatest risk for damage to the state budget and can occur at all stages of the process.
In the 2010 analysis "Public Procurement in Montenegro - Transparency and Liability," we stated that “the Police Directorate independently filed only three criminal charges over a period of three years on reasonable suspicion that criminal acts of abuse of official position in public procurement procedures were committed. According to available information, no final court verdicts for criminal acts in the field of public procurement have been issued so far.“ In the analysis, we also recommended that “the Police Directorate and the State Prosecutor's Office should approach the issue of identification and prosecution of criminal acts in the field of public procurement with particular attention.“
Fourteen years later, we investigated whether anything has changed by conducting interviews with state prosecutors, police officers, and control institutions, as well as gathering information on cases, indictments, and verdicts.
We analysed the period from January 2016 to July 2023, during which public procurement contracts worth over 3.5 billion euros were concluded in Montenegro. This is approximately the value of one annual budget of Montenegro, which for 2024 amounts to 3.48 billion. In the publication, we provide answers to the reasons for the absence of criminal liability, as well as recommendations for further action.
Public procurement in Montenegro is not efficient, and the challenges in this area are multiple. Despite the fact that Montenegro meets all the requirements of the European Union, public procurement as part of the system must be viewed in the Montenegrin context. We must have a focus on this area, especially from the aspect of high risk for corruption, even after the announced closure of the chapter.
These are some of the main conclusions from the final conference of the project “Public Procurement under Spotlight – Making Watchdogs Work!”, which is being implemented by Institute Alternative with the support of the Embassy of the Kingdom of the Netherlands.
President of the Managing Board of Institute Alternative (IA), Stevo Muk, announced that there was a need to put the topic of public procurement in focus, and that the main goal of the project was to empower and motivate the watchdogs of the budget to fight against corruption and improper influence in public procurement.
“Where there is the most money, the challenge of corruption is the greatest. In public procurement, two principles collide, the principle of legality – which includes procedures, transparency, protection of rights, and therefore time as a factor and consequence. On the other hand, the principle of efficiency – that goods, services and works are carried out on time, that they reach the citizens when they are needed (in quality and quantity as planned and promised)”, said Muk.
Muk emphasized that “if we were to conclude from the official data on the reported conflict of interest, reported suspicions of corruption, annulled contracts, indictments and verdicts – there is no illegality, no corruption.” It is hard to believe that in a country where corruption is widespread, almost traditionally based, there is no corruption in the procedures in which the largest part of the budget funds are distributed, over 600 million euros per year”.
“It is necessary to ensure the proactive cooperation of all independent supervisory institutions, and the highest level of guarantees and rewards for sources of information from the system,” Muk concluded.
First Secretary of the Embassy of the Kingdom of the Netherlands in Serbia and Montenegro Corwin van Strien pointed out that the issue of corruption in public procurement is an important topic.
“The rule of law is one of the main priorities of the Netherlands and that is the reason why we are providing support in the implementation of this project.” We have serious projects to eradicate corruption in public procurement. People are silent about corruption, and silence means approval. I remind you that uncovering corruption helps achieve the rule of law so that society starts to believe in institutions,” said van Strien.
The conference participants were also presented with a new database on public procurement available on the Mojnovac.me. The database provides an overview of all public procurement contracts concluded since 2021, and it is possible to search by bidders and contracting authorities.
During the panel “On the way to closing Chapter 5 (Public procurement) – what should be changed in the system?“, expert in the field of public procurement Daniel Ivarsson announced that in the last 10 years, progress has been made in the legislative and institutional sense in this area.
“You need to take into account the subject of the procurement, as well as the possibility of fraud and corruption, which is why it is extremely important to be transparent and keep records of all decisions at an early stage. It is the management’s responsibility to ensure and take steps to make the right decision in the procurement process,” underlined Ivarsson.
According to him, public procurement should take place on a competitive market. “What needs to be addressed in particular is whether there really is a competitive approach in terms of competitive offer, conditions and quality, or whether it is still a competition of privileged bidders who are in contact with decision makers,” Ivarsson pointed out.
The chairman of the Senate of the State Audit Institution (SAI) Nikola Kovačević announced that the SAI, at the proposal of Institute Alternative, controlled the implementation of simple procurements in 14 state and local institutions.
The audit of the regularity of the implementation of simple procurements in the public sector for 2023 showed that they are not implemented in accordance with the law. Of the 14 observed, 12 subjects of supervision did not report more than one and a half million euros spent through simple procurement. Only the Railway Administration and the Ministry of Health did not observe any irregularities.
As stated in the report, the SAI has placed a special focus on the way of carrying out simple procurement of goods, services and works, the annual value of which does not exceed 8 000 euros. The audit showed that most entities did not list all procurements in the report, that their procurement plans were unrealistic and were often changed, a large number of procurements were not carried out, procurement items were shared, and a large number of entities spent over 8,000 euros on direct procurements, without conducting the procedure through the electronic system.
The auditors also determined that more was paid for certain procurements than was agreed upon, and there were goods and services that were not even provided for in the contract. There were no contracts for certain procurements, the value of which was between four and eight thousand euros, while the deadlines for the delivery of goods, provision of services or performance of works were not respected. In addition, the public procurement commissions judged the offers of the bidders as correct, even though they did not meet all the conditions, and they were late in delivering the notification about the outcome of the procurement.
Kovačević suggested that work should be done on amending the Law, and that the recommendations were published as part of the audit report.
Melida Suljević, a member of the Commission for the Protection of Rights in the Public Procurement Process, pointed out that there was a significantly higher number of complaints than in previous years. She added that the Commission decided on all appeals in a timely manner, within the legal deadline.
Suljević said that a small number of complaints were filed about the procedural procedure of public procurement, which indicates that the Montenegrin Electronic System of Public Procurement (CEJN) made it easier for the contracting authorities to carry out the procedure with as few errors as possible. She added that the complaints mainly refer to wrongly established factual situation and wrong application of material regulations.
“Additional improvement of CEJN, through the introduction of automatic determination of the deadline for appeals, and automatic rejection of untimely appeals, would significantly contribute to the efficiency of the Commission’s work.” Additionally, it would be of particular importance for the Administrative Court to act more effectively in our cases,” she said.
General Inspector for Public Procurement Ivan Milićević announced that the challenges in the field of public procurement are multi-layered, first of all regarding the legislation, as well as the way in which procurement is carried out by direct acceptance of the invoice.
“From the point of view of the inspection, the biggest problem is that the misdemeanor provision for failure to comply with the Rulebook for the implementation of simple procurements was deleted from the Law.” In connection with the part of the SAI’s findings on non-declaration of procurement costs, we do not have a misdemeanor provision for records on simple procurements. “Even if we discover irregularities, we cannot penalize violators for that,” Milićević pointed out.
Speaking about the procurement of works, he recalled that he had access to a document from 2020, when the director of the Public Works Administration sent the Ministry of Sustainable Development a list of bidders who performed poorly on capital projects, with a proposal to revoke the license. “We see that the same bidders from the list are awarded contracts even today,” he concluded.
General Director of the Directorate for Public Investment Management and Public Procurement Policy in the Ministry of Finance, Jelena Jovetić, pointed out that according to the latest reports of the European Commission, one of the most fulfilled chapters is Chapter 5 (Public Procurement), and that we expect it to be closed by the end of the year.
She added that with regard to the closure of Chapter 5, all the requests of the EC have been implemented, including the last one from April, which limited the consumption of direct purchases on an annual level to 100,000 euros.
“The public procurement system in Montenegro should be more efficient. Public procurement lasts an average of 77 days and is not efficient. The procurement of works takes an average of 86 days. From the perspective of the public sector, it is a waste of public money, administrative capacities of the administration and economic entities,” said Jovetić.
“For the improvement of the public procurement system, it is crucial that we have substantive appeals procedures with serious allegations.” Unfortunately, we are currently constantly dealing with technical details rather than the essentials. We should be part of the EU and the public procurement system should respond to what the EU expects from us,” concluded Jovetić.
During the event, the UNCAC Resolution on promoting transparency and integrity in public procurement in order to support the goals of sustainable development, which was adopted by the Conference of States Parties to the United Nations Convention against Corruption in December 2023, was presented.
Due to delays in the implementation of the works, the Traffic Administration imposed penalties on the contractor in only two cases, while the Capital Projects Administration did not do so once. At the same time, by signing an annex, both state administrations enabled an increase in the agreed price of works for one project each, which increased the value of the contract by 1.3 million euros, according to the analysis of Institute Alternative.
The data comes from an analysis of twenty projects financed by the administrations for traffic and capital projects, for which they receive money from the state capital budget.
The implementation of the largest infrastructure projects, which are managed by the Traffic Administration, was mainly followed by annexes to the basic contracts, which often extended the deadline for the execution of the works, and which were signed most often in the last days before the originally defined deadline for the completion of the works.
Of the ten analyzed projects of the Traffic Administration, only three were completed without signing the annex. One contract was terminated, while a total of eight annexes were signed for the remaining six projects.
The deadline for the execution of works was extended for four projects, of which the deadline for one project was postponed twice, through contract annexes. For three projects, the annexes related to an additional advance payment, while in one case the annex increased the originally agreed price of the works.
On the other hand, the Capital Project Administration signed five contract annexes for ten analyzed projects. Of these, one annex related to the increase in the contracted price of the works, and all the others to the extension of the deadline for the completion of the works.
The analysis referred to ten tenders with the highest value each, which were contracted by the Traffic Administration and the Capital Projects Administration, and according to the data from the website for electronic procurement, the deadline for the execution of the works was tentatively defined by the contract for the end of last year or the beginning of this year. In addition to the tender documents and contracts, contract annexes, data on payments and penalties, deadlines for project implementation, the date of the contractor’s introduction to work were analyzed, and the data was obtained through a request for free access to information.
47 thousand euros from the collection of penalties to the Traffic Administration
In the contracts concluded by the Traffic Administration, it is stipulated that the contractor is obliged to pay the client 0.1% of the contracted price of all works for each day of overrun, if he does not complete the works within the stipulated time due to his own fault.
“The amount of the agreed penalty cannot exceed five percent of the agreed price of the works,” it is written in the analyzed contracts.
The Traffic Administration collected the penalty in the case of the reconstruction of Mojkovačka Street on the part of the road Cetinje – Njeguši in the amount of 7,235 euros. Penalties followed after annexes to the contract extended the deadline for the completion of the works on two occasions. With the basic contract worth 602 thousand euros, the company “Indel inženjering” undertook to complete the works by May 13, 2022. However, on May 9, just four days before the deadline, the date of completion of the works was moved by an annex to the contract by an additional 35 days, i.e. to June 17. On the last day for the completion of the works, a new annex to the contract is concluded, which moves the deadline again, this time by 25 days.
The justification for the extension of the works in both cases is, as stated in the annexes, the obstruction and blocking of the works by the locals due to unresolved property relations that are under the jurisdiction of the Royal Capital Cetinje, as well as changes in the project documentation and the impossibility of carrying out works on certain parts.
The works were finally completed on July 24, 12 days late, so the Traffic Administration charged penalties in the amount of 7,235 euros.
The deadline extension was also approved for the Bukovik 2 landslide rehabilitation project on the Petrovac-Podgorica highway. The work worth 1.31 million euros was awarded to the company “Intermost” from Podgorica.
“The contractor wrote to us with a proposal to extend the deadline for completing the works on the building. Referring to the mentioned items in the letter, which listed the previous suspensions of work due to necessary changes to the project, we believe that it is justified to extend the deadline for the completion of the works, given that the delay in completing the original deadline is not the contractor’s fault,” states the opinion of the Supervisory Service, which also follows controls the execution of works on the construction site.
The original deadline for the implementation of the works – September 17, 2023, was extended by an annex from September to October 20, 2023, based on changes to the project documentation.
“After the completion of the works and the final calculation, the contractor was charged penalties in the amount of 39,526 euros based on the delay,” stated the Traffic Administration.
The deadline has also been extended for the project of works on the rehabilitation of the walls on the main road Ribarevina – Dračenovac. The contract worth 1.43 million euros was concluded with the company “Construction and Consulting” on December 26, 2022, and the deadline for the completion of the works is defined as 180 days from the moment of the introduction of the contractor to the job, which is the end of September 2023.
However, with the annex signed by the Traffic Administration three days after the expiration of the original deadline, the new deadline was defined for October 28, 2023, and unusual weather conditions and the existence of a high-voltage energy cable were cited as the basis, which is why the works had to be carried out mechanically, instead of manually. As stated by the Administration, the works on this project have been completed.
An additional million was granted to “Bemax” by the annex
In November 2022, the Traffic Administration concluded with the construction company “Bemax” a contract worth 6.4 million euros (including VAT) for the reconstruction of the Mataševo-Kolašin regional road, with a deadline of eight months for the contractor to start work, i.e. from the handing over of the building permit, technical documentation, decision on the appointment of the Expert Supervision. “Bemax” was introduced to the business on April 20 last year, which means that it had to finish the work by December 20.
However, on that very date, the Traffic Administration concludes an annex to the contract with “Bemax”, which increases the total price of the works to 7.43 million, i.e. one million euros more than the originally agreed price. At the same time, the annex extends the deadline for the execution of works until February 23 of this year, which is two months more than the originally planned deadline.
In the annex, it is stated that due to unforeseen circumstances caused by bad weather conditions and heavy traffic load, there were significant changes in the condition of the slope and pavement structure compared to the state expected by the project, which caused the modification of the project documentation, which increased the value of the works.
The Law on Public Procurement defines that the value of the basic contract can be changed by up to 20%, without conducting a new public procurement procedure “when the need to change the contract arose due to circumstances that the client could not foresee at the time of concluding the contract”.
The reconstructed Matashevo-Kolašin road with a length of 8.5 kilometers was officially opened on January 31 of this year.
The Traffic Administration, which is headed by Radomir Vuksanović, said that the final expert supervision report and technical inspection are currently being prepared.
“After the completion of the technical review, the situation related to the withheld funds will be revealed,” they stated.
The Government enabled the payment of additional advances
The Traffic Administration signed another annex with “Bemax” in connection with this project at the end of December 2022, which refers to the approved advance payment in the amount of 641 thousand euros.
The basic contract defines that the advance payment amounts to five percent of the total price of the works.
The advance payment was approved by the Government of former Prime Minister Dritan Abazović on December 8, 2022, after the contractors submitted requests regarding the problems of the impossibility of fulfilling the contractual construction obligations due to the drastic increase in prices in the construction sector.
Based on that decision, the Traffic Administration paid to “Bemax” an additional advance of 650 thousand euros, for the first phase of the reconstruction project of the main road Podgorica-Tuzi, the total value of which is 5.37 million euros. Previously, as defined by the contract, an advance in the same amount was already paid.
Also, according to this decision of the Government, the Traffic Administration approved an advance payment of 59,678 euros to the contractor “Crna Gora Put” for the investment in the resurfacing of the asphalt pavement on the main and regional roads in the territory of Podgorica. The total value of the contract was almost 600,000 euros, and they did not provide for an advance payment.
The works on these two projects were completed within the agreed period, the Traffic Administration stated.
Only for three projects, and the smallest in terms of value, out of the ten analyzed, there were no contract annexes. These are projects for the resurfacing of asphalt for Pljevlja and Podgorica, and the construction of retaining walls on the reconstruction of the Dinoša-Cijevna Zatrijebačka road. The works for these projects were completed within the agreed deadlines.
The Capital Projects Administration did not charge penalties
The analysis of the ten largest projects of the Capital Projects Administration showed that in one case an annex was signed, which increased the price of the basic contract, while the other annexes extended the deadlines for the completion of the works. The subject of analysis for the Capital Projects Administration were contracts that were signed before 2023, and which defined the deadline for the execution of works up to 12 months from the day the contractor was introduced to the job.
The signed annex to the contract, which increased the price of the basic contract, related to the project of creating a conceptual solution, the main project and the execution of works on the construction of the access plateau at the location of the departure station of the Kotor – Lovćen cable car.
This job worth 2.75 million euros (including VAT) was awarded to the company “Briv construction” at the end of September 2022. However, with the annex to the contract from August last year, the Capital Projects Administration signs an annex with the contractor that contracts “the performance of unforeseen works”, so the price of the basic contract increases to 3.06 million, or by 11%.
The Administration for Capital Projects stated that 2.83 million euros have been paid to the contractor for this project so far, and that the works have been completed.
Deadlines are being extended due to poor project documentation
As for the other analyzed contracts of the Administration for Capital Projects, work has been completed on another four projects, while the remaining five have not yet been completed.
In addition to the plateau, “Briv construction” also completed work on the construction of the road for the cable car, and the value of the project was 1.6 million euros. The works on the rehabilitation of the road Maočići-Velimlje, Petrovići and the road Kruševica, Vrbanj, Orijen were also completed within the agreed period.
The largest project of 7.2 million euros is the construction of the Mental Health Clinic, which is being carried out by “Fidija”. The contract stipulated that the works would be completed at the end of January this year. However, with the annex dated January 29, the deadline was moved to July 15. During the execution of the works, the Ministry of Health as a user, as stated by the Capital Projects Administration, expressed the need for additional harmonization of the project documentation in order to put the facility into operation with the specific needs of the ministry.
“For the stated reasons, there was an extension of the deadline for the completion of the works, not through the fault of the contractor, which was also confirmed by the statement of the expert supervision,” explainedfrom Capital Projects Administration.
The work has not been completed for the second largest project in terms of value – the reconstruction and construction of the Faculty of Architecture. The work worth 3.4 million euros is being carried out by the company “Stambeno”, which was launched on March 1 last year. The deadline for the completion of the works, according to the contract available at CEJN, is set for March 1 of this year. This deadline was moved to September 1 with an annex dated February 27, and the reason was again bad project documentation.
“Given the omissions and deficiencies in the revised project documentation that was submitted to the Capital Projects Administration, and on the basis of which the contractor performs the works, the user initiated an amendment to the main project with the designer, which led to the prolongation of the works.” As this prolongation was not caused by the fault of the contractor, which was also confirmed by the statement of the expert supervision, the annex to the contract was concluded,” said the CPA.
The multimillion-dollar hangar construction projects at the “Knjaz Danilo” Military Airport and the “13.jul” barracks, carried out by the “Eurozox” company, are also still not finished, although the contracts for these two projects were signed at the end of 2022. The basic contract for the construction of a hangar for the accommodation of lightly armored vehicles and a workshop for the maintenance of motor vehicles in the “13.jul” barracks stipulates that the works on the 2.1 million euro project will be completed on September 11 last year. Only on February 22 of this year was the annex signed with the company “Eurozox”, which moved the deadline for the execution of the works to July 15 of this year.
The Capital Projects Administration said that the deadline was extended because at the beginning of the works, the existence of underground electrical and energy installations on the building was established, the relocation of which is carried out according to CEDIS procedures, as well as due to numerous deficiencies in the project documentation.
The existence of underground installations that needed to be relocated was an obstacle to starting work on the project to build an aircraft reception and servicing facility at the “Knjaz Danilo” Military Airport in Golubovci.
The Administration states that because of this, there was a delay with the introduction of the contractor into the work, the deadline for the completion of the works expires only after the contractor is introduced into the work, which is 210 days.
As stated by CPA, most of the contracted works were completed within the deadline, but due to non-conformity of the project documentation and minor subsequent requests of users/investors “whose goal is the full functionality of the built facility and the execution of new positions of the works, the deadline for the completion of the works was extended through no fault of their contractor, which was also later confirmed by the statement of expert supervision”.
Although the deadline for the completion of the works for this project was extended, the Administration did not state that they had signed the annex to the contract allowing this.
The deadline for the construction of the Science and Technology Park facility was extended by an annex dated May 20. The contract for this project was signed at the end of 2021 with the company “Novi Volvox”, but, as stated by CPA, the works were prolonged due to numerous omissions and deficiencies in the project documentation.
“The works are in the phase of functional testing and the planned completion date until the end of May has been extended, considering that the user has not ensured the connection of the building to the water and electricity network, which is necessary in order to complete the functional testing of installations, systems and equipment”, they said from CPA.
The science and technology park was officially opened on June 11.
“Regarding the part of the request that refers to the payment of penalties, we point out that no penalties were charged for any of the projects listed in the request,” the Capital Projects Administration announced.
The administrations for traffic and capital projects terminated one signed contract each.
The work for the reconstruction of the Tuzi-Mataguži road was awarded in December 2021 to the “Tehnoput” company, and the contracted value of the works was 3.36 million euros, with a deadline of 300 days from the day the contractor was introduced to the job.
“The project has not been started, the contract has been terminated, also in connection with this project, the agreement on the implementation of works between the Traffic Administration and the Municipality of Tuzi has been terminated due to non-resolution of property legal relations by the Municipality of Tuzi,” stated the Traffic Administration, without specifying whether there were costs on that basis.
The Capital Projects Administration terminated the contract with the company “Krušo” for 750 thousand euros in connection with the construction of the road for the needs of the bus station in the Bare – Igalo settlement.
The Administration said that in connection with this project, the Municipality of Herceg Novi concluded a contract with the contractor “Entext inženjering”, and that the project is being implemented in accordance with the contract that the municipality signed with the Capital Projects Administration.
“The contractor was put into work on October 15, 2023, while the expected completion date is the end of November 2024,” they stated.
The original terminated contract signed in June 2022 stipulated that the works be carried out within a year from the introduction of the contractor to the job.
Author: Ivan Ivanović
This investigative article was produced within the Project “Procurement under spotlight – Making Watchdogs Work!”, with the support of the Embassy of the Kingdom of the Netherlands in Serbia and Montenegro within the MATRA Rule of Law program. Project aims to empower and motivate watchdogs to combat corruption and undue influence in public procurement.
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Two committees, two different interpretations of the competition requirements, and a candidate who suffers because the healthcare institution had not defined all the procedures for filling the position, while the responsible inspection claims it doesn’t have sufficient authority.
A medical certificate, which ministries require only from candidates already selected after a job announcement, proved to be an insurmountable obstacle in this public institution, to the detriment of the candidate who was just one step away from securing the job.
The video stories were created within the project “Strengthening Demand for Merit Based Recruitment: Roadmap to Meritocracy”, which Institute Alternative is implementing with the support of the British Embassy in Podgorica. The content is the sole responsibility of Institute Alternative and does not necessarily reflect the views of the donors.
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Muk emphasized that “if we were to conclude from the official data on the reported conflict of interest, reported suspicions of corruption, annulled contracts, indictments and verdicts – there is no illegality, no corruption.” It is hard to believe that in a country where corruption is widespread, almost traditionally based, there is no corruption in the procedures in which the largest part of the budget funds are distributed, over 600 million euros per year”.
Melida Suljević, a member of the Commission for the Protection of Rights in the Public Procurement Process, pointed out that there was a significantly higher number of complaints than in previous years. She added that the Commission decided on all appeals in a timely manner, within the legal deadline.
“The public procurement system in Montenegro should be more efficient. Public procurement lasts an average of 77 days and is not efficient. The procurement of works takes an average of 86 days. From the perspective of the public sector, it is a waste of public money, administrative capacities of the administration and economic entities,” said Jovetić.