At the end of 2023, the Cantonal Prosecutor’s Office in Sarajevo issued an order not to conduct an investigation against Natasa Fazlic, the director of “Sarajevoputevi”, as there is no suspicion that she abused her position or authority.
The decision of the Prosecutor’s Office states that, based on currently applicable regulations, the obligation of “Sarajevoputevi” to conduct public procurement procedures is not clearly and unambiguously defined. The Prosecutor’s Office also notes that the Public Procurement Agency of Bosnia and Herzegovina (BiH) considers itself “not competent to determine whether someone is subject to the Law on Public Procurement or not”.
For Srdjan Traljic from Transparency International (TI) BiH, who filed a criminal complaint against the management of “Sarajevoputevi” in 2019 for not complying with the Law on Public Procurement, the opinion of the Canton Sarajevo (CS) Prosecutor’s Office is dangerous because other public enterprises could emulate this practice.
“Sarajevoputevi” claim they do not have the status of a public enterprise
“Sarajevoputevi” states that, according to legislation and previous opinions of the Public Procurement Agency, they are not subject to the Law on Public Procurement, as they face competition in the market, participate in public procurement procedures, and have a purely commercial character.
They claim not to have the status of a public enterprise and that they are not funded from the budget but based on contracts they obtain through participation in public procurement procedures. They also state that the status of the company “Sarajevoputevi” is not clearly defined, nor does the company’s general acts define it as public, nor does it have the prefix “Public Enterprise” in its name.
The Audit Office for the Institutions in Federation of BiH (FBiH) in 2018 noted that “Sarajevoputevi” conducted procurements of goods and services worth over five BAM without following the procedures outlined in the Law on Public Procurement and did not draft a procurement plan when preparing the business plan for that year, despite being obliged to do so.
Traljic says that “Sarajevoputevi” distributed jobs without tenders and non-transparently in 2018, during which not all interested parties had the opportunity to apply.
“I truly believe this is a dangerous thing. Simply avoiding tendering opens up a huge space for corruption,” he adds.
The Public Procurement Agency says that the decision of “Sarajevoputevi” to not apply the Law for a period and then to reapply it is absurd in itself.
“Ceste” has not been applying the law for over a year
The Assembly of “Ceste”, consisting of the FBiH and other shareholders of the company, in September 2022 adopted Amendments to the Statute of “Ceste”, which also affected procurement procedures. “Ceste” then informed the Public Procurement Agency about the activities carried out, indicating that all future procurement procedures would be conducted in accordance with the Statute and the Procurement Rules of “Ceste”.
“Ceste” added that they are neither a public enterprise nor a contracting authority and that making a profit is their fundamental goal. According to them, “Ceste” faces competition in the market and operates in normal market conditions without any monopoly, privileged position, or other exclusive rights granted by state bodies.
“These are public enterprises that almost exclusively work with the state. So, they work on maintaining public infrastructure, they get jobs through tenders. I wouldn’t go into how much real competition there is. But if 450 companies can conduct public procurement, I don’t see what the problem is for these two companies,” Traljic concludes, Detektor reports.
E.Dz.
