Silvana Vallejo: “Prices doubled in special regime”

Ecuadornews:

In the decentralized autonomous governments, this figure of public contracting was used more.

Around $ 400 million is intended to save the government through corrections in the public purchase, which include restrictions on contracting by special regime and amendments to the corresponding law.

The National Public Procurement Service (Sercop) carried out a study with the World Bank and the conclusion was that there were abuses when using the figure of special regime, because it was not used only to attend exceptional cases.

What findings did the study reveal with the World Bank?

When analyzing the prices in which they were contracted with the special regime versus if they had been contracted by common regime, if they entered into competition, it would have meant a saving of $ 1,400 million because the prices obtained in special regime were twice more expensive on average. That is because each entity that goes to the special regime establishes its regulation.

The majority of the hiring took place in the months of October, November and December. At the beginning we found that the way to evade and contract directly was in the inter-administrative institutions. The greatest findings were in the decentralized autonomous governments (GAD).

How is it understood that they have had this price increase if it is assumed that the efficiency of the public purchase was sought?

One of the reasons was that if I already identified a single supplier, I am almost forming monopoly conditions, then the price will not be the lowest. Second, the contracting entities have a lot of responsibility when it comes to preparing their referential budgets, which is why with Senplades and Finanzas we will act to establish the referential budget.

Several sectors claim that there was corruption through the special regime, what do you think?

We have a specific case that we detect. They were addresses to suppliers that did not meet requirements. That is an example that obviously lends itself to undermining corruption. Not all cases are like that, some could have done their processes responsibly. We are not saying that all the cases were bad, but there was less competition. (I)

Source: https://www.eltelegrafo.com.ec/noticias/economia/4/silvanavallejo-sercop-bancomundial-gads-ecuador