HN: Prague has announced a problematic contract worth 800 million crowns

Prague - The Prague city hall has issued a problematic tender concerning the reconstruction of the New Town Hall and the Clam-Gallas Palace at Mariánské Square. The value of the contract is 800 million crowns, and doubts have surrounded it from the beginning. The city hall announced the tender just before the elections with an extraordinarily short deadline. This is reported by today's Hospodářské noviny (HN).
    With the extraordinarily short deadline for submitting bids, municipal officials, according to the newspaper, violated the law. "The deadline is 30 days, fully in accordance with the law," said Prague councilor Ondřej Pecha (ODS), who is in charge of the project.
    The city hall announced the tender on July 19 and set the deadline for bids at August 19. However, the law on public contracts states that the shortest possible deadline is 37 days. Exceptions do not apply in this case. Pecha could not explain why the city hall set such a short deadline, the newspaper reported.
    The head of the Czech branch of Transparency International, David Ondráčka, told the paper that a shorter deadline raises suspicions that a candidate who was aware of the contract earlier has already been chosen and managed to prepare. The construction company Skanska CS, which is applying for the tender, does not consider the shorter deadline a problem. The shorter deadline is also not an issue for the company Hochtief CZ, which is also vying for the contract.
    HN points out that even after the presentation of qualification capabilities, the law states 37 days as the shortest deadline. There is no discussion about the presentation of qualification capabilities anymore.
    The competition for the reconstruction project of Mariánské Square was won last year by the consortium MAC Architecture and DaM. The architects had two months to prepare their bid, which is twice as long as the time currently available to construction companies. According to the architects, the repair of the two buildings was supposed to cost 700 million crowns. Pecha did not explain why the city hall added a hundred million reserve to the tender. He also does not know where Prague will get the money for the reconstruction.
    "It will depend on the council what amount will be allocated to this investment project for the year 2011. The new council will decide on the investment," Pecha stated. Major investment projects in Prague are always discussed in the finance committee. However, the committee has not seen the project for the revitalization of Mariánské Square, today's HN wrote.