On June 13, Transparency International Ukraine and the community of civil society organizations united around the DOZORRO platform urged members of Dnipro city council to vote against abolition of competitive pre-threshold procurement.

Today, on June 18, press-conference “The Threat of Abolition of Electronic Procurement Procedure through ProZorro for Pre-Threshold Procurement in Dnipro” took place.

The participants included:

  • Max Nefyodov, First Deputy Minister of Economic Development and Trade of Ukraine
  • Jaanika Merilo – acting deputy mayor of Dnipro
  • Viktor Nestulia – director of the innovation projects program of Transparency International Ukraine.

Watch the full video here.

If the provision about competitive procurement under UAH 3000 through ProZorro is cancelled, it will impede the development of small and medium business, bring the city back to “manual allocation of funds” and hide public procurement from the public.

Viktor Nestulia, director of TI Ukraine’s innovation projects program, spoke about the risks and threats of the initiative of the city council members. “Those interested in development and promotion of their interests with integrity support pre-threshold procurement,” says Nestulia. “If somebody is the kind of person who buys votes ‘for buckwheat,” perhaps, non-competitive pre-threshold procurement is the easiest way to find the funds for that.”

According to the Law of Ukraine “On Public Procurement,” pre-threshold procurement is under UAH 200,000. Local authorities can establish the line of pre-threshold procurement by themselves. Viktor Nestulia: “Kyiv School of Economics has recently done an in-depth study which showed that the real reasonable threshold of pre-threshold procurement may be as low as UAH 4 thousand.”

Read more via Hromadske Radio (in Ukrainian): https://hromadskeradio.org/news/2018/06/18/cherez-skasuvannya-prozorro-u-dnipri-misto-mozhe-vtratyty-144-mln-grn-detali