The government resorted to rarely-used extraordinary public procurement rules to allocate a €1.5-million contract to a company in connection with a mini-EU summit on Friday.
Despite knowing, at least since January, that Prime Minister Joseph Muscat would host six of his counterparts from Southern EU member states for an hour-and-a-half meeting at his office tomorrow, the tender for the necessary services was only issued in the beginning of May under the so-called “accelerated procedure”.
The rules, which according to law are only to be used in “a state of urgency”, allow the authorities to narrow the timeframe allowed for the submission of a tender to just 15 working days rather than the normal 35 days.
The Times of Malta was told that, as a result of the “accelerated procedure”, only one company submitted an offer and was eventually awarded the contract by the Office of the Prime Minister.
The company is TEC Ltd, which supplies the Labour Party with most of the equipment, including massive tents, for public activities during the electoral campaigns, including the most recent elections.
TEC Ltd is owned by Carmel Magro, a former General Workers’ Union employee, who was given dozens of government direct orders since Labour was returned to power in 2013, particularly by the Office of the Prime Minister.
Industry sources said “no one even bothered to submit an offer” for the mini-summit, except for TEC Ltd.
Seemed to be written for a particular company
“It was also obvious from day one that the specifications of the tender seemed to be written for a particular company,” the owner of a large events company told this newspaper.
Questions to the Office of the Prime Minister on why the government employed the “accelerated procedure” remained unanswered by the time of writing.
Unlike previous tenders issued on similar occasions, including events during Malta’s EU presidency and the organisation of the Commonwealth summit, this time round, Castille also decided to issue just one tender on a turnkey basis.
Thus, the company, which specialises in tents, was also engaged to organise all the aspects of the summit, including transport, public relations and accreditation facilities for journalists, security personnel, scriptwriting for documentaries and even the catering for the event, the sources said.
The mini-summit, in which the leaders of Malta, Cyprus, France, Greece, Italy, Spain and Portugal will be participating, aims at coordinating common positions for the crucial EU summit to be held in Brussels next week.
Senior diplomats told this newspaper the summit was “the best lobbying opportunity” for the Prime Minister to try to persuade his colleagues to propose his nomination for one of the EU’s top jobs.
ivan.camilleri@timesofmalta.com