Lately, I was wondering about the public procurements to be made by the Parliament in 2020, most often at excessively expensive costs. Floral compositions, travel tickets abroad, tableware, refrigerator, safes, diesel, car spare parts – all tied in a list of over 80 items. However, while trying to find a similar list on the Executive’s website, I failed. 

The latest information regarding the public procurements on cancelaria.gov.md of the State Chancellery dates July 5, 2019, and contains a report on monitoring the contracts of the first semester of 2019. 

At the same time, unlike in 2019, when a public procurement plan was published in January, now, in 2020, there is no information about the public procurements to be made. Similarly, there is no data revealing how the public money was spent in 2019 when over 570,000 euros (11 million lei) had been allocated for education and vocational training services, another 518,000 euros (10 million lei) had gone to the expert services and evaluation of public policies, around 3,000 euros (60 000 lei) was paid for some folk costumes, and over 17,000 euros (333,333 lei) went on organizing the National Prize award ceremony.

According to the document posted by the State Chancellery, in 2019, the money was spent on purchasing flowers, office supplies, transport services, drinking water, receiving delegations, as well as paying for medals and boxes (packages), all in all, 59 items of expenditure.

On gov.md, the general website of the Government, the latest information in which we can find the public procurements phrase was posted on December 10, 2016, and it was signed by then Prime Minister Pavel Filip, in the context of approving the Strategy for the public procurement system development for 2016-2020 and the Action Plan for its implementation. 

Therefore, after the approval of the Strategy, any public data regarding the public procurements disappeared from the official page of the Executive.        

We have further verified data on the official pages of other institutions subordinated to the Government regarding the public procurements to be made in 2020. 

The National Insurance Company in Medicine contains only summary information from 2019, nothing more. 

The web page of the State Protection and Security Service holds a news item with hidden data, of which nothing is known – The State Protection and Security Service initiates the procedure for purchasing auto painting services.

According to its official site, the National Social Insurance House seems to have had the last public procurement in 2018, as there is no updated information since then. 

Likewise, the Public Property Agency holds very brief information, the latest referring to the purchase, in 2019, of a lot of Xerox paper, worth over 1,000 euros (20,000 lei). 

The Medicines and Medical Devices Agency has an inaccessible website, while according to the website ansa.gov.md, the National Agency for Food Safety does not make purchases of products and services. 

There are only two statements, placed in the Finance and Accounting section, which include the “Estimate of expenditures for the IPPC / FAO Regional Seminar with the generic ‘Plant health and institutional capacity development for states of Europe and Central Asia” and “Estimate of expenditures for the Quarantine Plant Coordination Council of the Community of Independent States meeting”. 

Both events took place in 2019, with an allocated budget of around 4,000- 11,200 euros (79,800 and 216,500 lei) correspondingly, without organizing any competitions or auctions.

Despite the fact that the government has repeatedly pledged that public money should be spent transparently, today, the official pages of central public authorities do not display data on public procurements to be made in 2020. 

Therefore, we’re asking ourselves what does the government hide.