The PLD government instated dozens of laws and regulations to combat administrative corruption. Nevertheless, in government procurement loopholes and sheer negligence in complying with the laws and regulations were what prevailed, as Carlos Pimentel, the new director of the Procurement Agency (DGCP) reveals in an interview with El Dia.
Pimentel explains that complicity between private and public sectors degenerated in record levels of corruption. Pimentel explained that in any country there will be corruption, “but in our czse there was impunity and a high level of complicity between many sectors.” Pimentel remarked in the interview: “Those that have a long time in government say they had never seen such a level of cooperation.”
He spoke of the modality of camouflaging rental tenders as a way to lease public property to third parties. He also spoke of how the agency was an accomplice to delaying payments as a step to extortion of government suppliers.
He said the Procurement Agency has filed four criminal cases with the Attorney General Office. These are cases for purchases of asphalt when Gonzalo Castillo was minister of Public Works, two of the National Childhood Welfare Agency (Inabie), and another in the Social Plan of the Presidency. “We identified that in those institutions there was a structure that sought to take advantage of the procurement for personal profiteering,” he said in the interview with El Dia.
Pimentel said that in the first 90 days of the new government, 9,243 persons and companies have registered to be providers to the state. He said another 2,500 have updated their registries. He identified this as a sign of the new trust of the population in the processes.
He spoke of new platform to follow up the tender processes and determine possible irregularities. He said the system will be able to identify when companies with the same shareholders participate in a tender. He mentioned the Procurement Agency seeks to create new opportunities for small business. He said the law requires that 20% of the tenders go to small companies and 5% to small business head by women.
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El Dia
23 November 2020