The company owned by the sister of the director of public works in Tirana municipality, Taulant Tusha has won a massive tender from the Tirana Parking parking agency, raising questions about a potential conflict of interest.
Tirana City Agency – Tirana Parking, which is building a payload network in the capital opened in mid-October a procurement procedure with a limit fund of 67.7 million ALL for the purchase of ‘machinery and equipment for the squares’.
This contract with a 6-week execution deadline had the object of procuring a number of automated and integrated parking systems with detailed technical specifications, including devices that range from entry and exit barriers to parking, to multiparking management system which will be offered.
After the closing of the procurement procedures, the winner of this tender was announced company ADVANCED Sh.pk in cooperation with ED Construction and Adi Professional Sh.pk, with a bid of 63.7 million lek or 94% of the limit fund.
There were no other bidders in the tender. Meanwhile, the documents discovered by BIRN indicate that the main winning company is owned by the sister of the Tirana Public Works Director, Taulant Tusha, what raises questions about a possible conflict of interest in the procurement process of the contract.
Contacted by BIRN, the Municipality denied that this was a case of conflict of interest, underlining that Tirana Parking is a separate institution and that the sister of the director is not included in the cases provided by law.
“Tirana Parking is a separate institution and the Director of Public Works has no institutional influence and decision-making. Tirana Parking, as a subsidiary institution, has budget and independent structures from the Municipality of Tirana for procurement procedures, “Tirana Municipality said through a spokesman.
“There is no conflict of interest under the law except for persons (father, mother, wife or children) if it has not participated in decision-making in the case of the same institution and, of course, is not analyzed as a legal case for another institution with structure and independent authorities, “the municipality added.
Tirana Parking is an agency subordinated to Tirana Municipality, created in November 2015, with the purpose of managing street and off-road parking. According to the Municipal Council Decision no. 48, taken on November 11, 2015, the main functional duties of Tirana Parking include: administering public parking with pay, on land and underground; as well as planning, tracking and implementation of investments in the infrastructure necessary for public pay parking service.
The latest procurement of parking lot equipment was part of the agency’s investment to extend its service network across the Tirana Municipality area.
The only participant in the open procedure was the merger of the companies ADVANCED Sh.pk, ED Konstruksion and Adi Professional – which was declared winner in the absence of other bids.
ADVANCED Sh.pk was established in February 2008 under the name ADVANCED SECURITY SYSTEMS, having as its object the activities of electronic projects, public safety and automated installations. She lists among her clients some of the leading companies in Albania such as Vodafone, AMC, Tirana Bank, and the Tirana Municipality – for which she writes on her web site that she has served as subcontractor in several lighting projects.
The company’s founding act shows that at the beginning there were four shareholders, each owning 25% of the shares. Two of the shareholders, Viktor Mitrevski and Teodor Begov are Macedonian citizens, the third was Greek citizen Stefano Papazios and the fourth Albanian citizen Taulant Tusha – who is currently serving as the director of public works in the municipality of Tirana.
On May 8, 2008, Stefano Pazios and Taulant Tusha sold their quotes to Albanian citizen Edlira Hoxha for 50 thousand ALL. The civil registry records and the sales act show that Hoxha is Taulant Tusa’s eldest sister. Later, in 2010, Hoxha bought the shares of two other Macedonian partners, becoming the sole owner of the company. In 2013, the company changed its name from ADVANCED SECURITY SYSTEMS to ADVANCED Sh.pk.
Tusha has been appointed as director of public works in the municipality of Tirana in September 2015, following the election of the mayor of Erion Veliaj. Previously, he served as director of support services at the Ministry of Social Welfare and Youth – from October 2013 to September 2015, when Veliaj served as Minister.
The Directorate of Public Works is the most important directorate in the Municipality of Tirana, including in its responsibilities, besides public works and investments, procurements, road transport and civil emergencies. Although the Tirana Parking agency is an institution under the Tirana municipality, it is unclear whether Director Tusha has played a role – a possibility that the municipality deny – in the tender for the parking space equipment of its former ADVANCED company, already owned of the sister.
The Law on Conflict of Interest imposes a continuous restriction on senior officials of local government units and some of their family members in relation to contracts with institutions under jurisdiction.
Annex 7 of the standard tender documents, which is related to the statement of the economic operator’s conflict of interest, provides that “a senior management official of a local government unit, a detention due to the private interests of the officer set forth in this point applies only to the conclusion of contracts, as the case may be, with the municipality, commune or district council where the official exercises these functions. This prohibition applies even when the party to the contract is a public institution, depending on this unit, “as is the Tirana Parking agency.
The ongoing limitation available to senior local government officials to win by public open tenders from subordinate public institutions also applies to a part of his family members, including “parents. spouse, cohabitant, and adult children. The sister of an official is not involved in affiliated persons, who are denied the right to enter into contracts, although it is not excluded that in the present case there were no other forms of conflict of interest.
