The 15m-euro tender for SMART labs in 9-year-old schools is covered with strong allegations of corruption. The National Information Agency has twice changed mandatory criteria for qualifications, just when it was scheduled to open tender bids by adding a security certificate

This is an unprecedented case, when a contractor authority changes the criteria for the procurement procedure right on the day of the tender, when offers were expected to be opened. Doubts are that through these changes, the ASHI seeks to limit competition and exclude company competitions from taking the tender where it is designated.

Tender

The tender for implementation of SMART labs was announced at the Public Procurement Agency on July 24th. It envisions setting up SMART labs in the country's 216 schools for a total fund of $1 billion of $69m, or 15.2m euros on the current course.

The date for the opening of the tender bids was scheduled for August 24th. But right on this date, The AKSHI has deposited two extensions for changing criteria.

In the first appendix, AKSHI has decided that employees of participating companies in the race should be equipped with CSP security certificate issued by the National Authority for Classified Information Insurance.

But a little later, he added another one, changing the safety certificate criterion again and now demanding it, not for all company employees, but only for those who will access the government database.

Consequently, the new date of the tender development has been postponed for September 6th. But in this case the postponement is of no importance that the procedure to equip a security certificate worker lasts several months. So the introduction of this criterion on the day of the tender makes it impossible to participate in companies that have no employees equipped with certificates. While foreign companies with this criteria are practically excluded from the race.

The change of criteria twice per day -- for more on the tender day -- casts strong doubts that the rules of the game in the tender are not defined in state offices, but in those of private companies, which sew and change them on occasion -- not to allow competition.

Three Prices Over the Cost

The 15.2m-euro lab tender envisions the establishment of labs in 216 schools in the country. In some schools the labs will contain 14 laptops, in some other 17 laptops and in a smaller number of schools, the labs will have 19 laptop balls and several IT aids.

Consequently, the state will pay an average of 70 thousand euros for a laboratory, containing 17 laptops and several IT aid devices. This price is inflated dramatically, when the average cost of a laptop stands at nearly 3 thousand euros.

This is the second tender for SMART labs in schools. The first took place last year. It envisioned the implementation of labs in 100 schools in the country with a $320 million fund and was won by the company Advanced Business Solutions, one of the largest subcontactors in the AKSI tenders.

This time it's 216 schools so 2.1 times school more than last year, but the fund has increased by over 5 times. This is another fact that shows the drastic growth of the price and the criteria that are being ordered to take the tender to the right place.