The Sub-committee for Internal Market and Competition represents an important encounter between the delegation of Montenegro and the EU on the issues of meeting political and economic criteria of accession, as well as other key aspects of the implementation of the Stabilisation and Association Agreement on one hand and, on the other, realization of the plans made by the institutions dealing with public procurement policy in Montenegro.

The aim of this meeting was to provide an overview of the activities undertaken in a dynamic process that took place within the required time, to extract the most important elements related to the acquis and its implementation.

Also, the key challenges and planned activities in the field of overcoming them were stated at the meeting, as well as the financial consequences and the necessary changes in administrative structures, with an aim to, through a more effective cooperation and providing better quality of the decision-making process, meet the obligations arising from the negotiation chapter.

The Public Procurement Administration was represented by its director, PhD Mersad Mujević, the Head of the Working Group for the Chapter 5 Public Procurement, who spoke about the activities conducted by the Administration during the period 2015/16 and on the future challenges in the field of public procurement policy in Montenegro. He emphasized in particular the activities on fulfilment of closing benchmarks which were numerous and all of them were commenced or planned, defined by time limits and submitted to the Government for information purposes. The working team of the PPA, apart from Mr Mujević, was composed also of Mrs Svetlana Tomović.

Director Mujević said in his speech that the public procurement system in our country is based on the principles of transparency, equal treatment, freedom of market competition and non-discrimination. The PPL does not recognize preferential treatment for domestic suppliers over the foreign ones. According to the Montenegrin PPL, the companies from the EU, as well as those outside the EU, may compete at Montenegrin tenders under the same conditions which apply to domestic companies. This implies that there is no preferential treatment of domestic bidders over the foreign economic operators. This treatment has been additionally confirmed in July 2015 by submission of ratification instruments to the WTO/GPA Committee, whereby our country has become a full member of the plurilateral Government Procurement Agreement and fulfilled its assumed international obligation in a short time frame. Thus, joining the Government Procurement Agreement of the WTO, we ensured the access to the public procurement market of the most developed countries of the world. Montenegro is the first country to accede to this Agreement after its revision.

The institutions established for that purpose are prepared to ensure compliance with the regulatory framework at all levels and to ensure an effective system of legal protection in public procurement procedures.

In addition, Mr Mujević introduced the representatives of EU to the activities regarding the MNE draft law on public-private partnerships and concessions as well as the status of the project of electronic public procurement.

EU representatives were particularly interested in issues regarding the progress on the Strategy for the Development of the Public Procurement System for the period 2016-2020 with the accompanying AP, the administrative capacities of: the Public Procurement Administration, the State Commission for Control of Public Procurement Procedures, the Concessions Commission, the Administration for Inspection Affairs, the Help Desk within the Public Procurement Administration.

An important part of the discussion was regarding the Statistical report prepared by the PPA and submitted to the Government of Montenegro.

Specific questions were concerning the work of the State Commission and its statistics regarding relations with the Administrative Court of Montenegro, as well as issues concerning the Inspection for public procurement about the reporting on the control over the execution of contracts.

On behalf of the EU, the meeting was chaired by Ms Maria Fernandez (DG NEAR, Montenegro Team), assisted by Mr Alexander Fricke (DG NEAR) and Ms Carmen Raluca IPATE (Policy Officer for Access to Procurement Markets).

The Montenegrin delegation was led by Deputy Head of the Committee Ms. Rada Marković, Deputy Director of the Administration for Inspection Affairs of Montenegro.

The visit of EU experts to Montenegro was announced for September this year, when these and some other issues related to the advancement of public procurement policy in our country will be discussed.

 

PR SERVICE OF THE PPA