Corruption in the sphere of public procurement

The topic of corruption in our time is quite relevant. She has been featured in many news years, and stories about the arrest of government officials for taking bribes are gaining popularity. The problem of corruption and counteraction to it has become especially acute in recent years - both in the world and in Kyrgyzstan.

It is determined by the extremely high level of national and social danger of the social phenomenon under consideration. As a result of corruption offenses, the rights and legitimate interests of citizens and organizations are infringed upon, colossal material damage is caused. Corruption in Kyrgyzstan is a serious problem. According to the Corruption Perceptions Rating, the corruption index for Kyrgyzstan is gradually changing, while the position of Kyrgyzstan in the rating of countries is slowly improving: from 130th to 126th place. But, more than half of citizens do not believe that they can contribute to the fight against corruption in Kyrgyzstan.

Kyrgyzstan was ranked 126th out of 180 places in the Corruption Perceptions Index 2019, which is compiled every year by the international organization Transparency International. Kyrgyzstan received 30 points out of 100, being on a par with Djibouti, Ukraine and Azerbaijan.

Table 1 - Ranking of countries according to the Corruption Perceptions Index from 2006-2019

Source: Compiled by the author.

Corruption in public procurement is a worldwide problem of humanity. This topic of corruption in the field of procurement for state and municipal needs is most relevant, since this direction of economic activity in our state appeared not so long ago, but was formed and received legislative confirmation only in the middle of the first decade of the 21st century. This is connected, first of all, with the historical reasons for the development of events in our state and, as a consequence, with the emergence of private property.

The most common corruption schemes include:

• The direction of the potential supplier participating in the collusion for the amount obviously lower than that of other participants in public procurement;
• The establishment by the customer of extremely short terms for the implementation of the order or the performance of work, in which the execution of the order is possible only by a previously prepared supplier - a participant in the fraudulent scheme;
• The establishment of a deliberately uncompetitive price for the execution of a government order in the indicated volume, which will be of no interest to other potential suppliers;
• The establishment of an unattractive payment scheme for the execution of a state order (for example, with a long delay, etc.);
• Incorrect data entry (for example, mixing Cyrillic and Latin when writing the name of the application, etc.);
• the interpretation of the criteria for evaluating suppliers in favor of stakeholders, etc.

So, corruption is an international problem, and almost every country in the world is faced with it on one scale or another. The level of corruption in the countries of the world in 2020 is closely related to the level of political and economic indicators of the state. This is due to the legal culture of the population, the effectiveness of the law enforcement system, education and provision of the population.

The main task of combating corruption in the field of government orders is to control the integrity of suppliers and ensure the greatest independence of employees who exercise quality control and on whose decision the fate of a contract depends.

The main areas of fraud prevention in public procurement include the following:

• Clear formulation of procurement requirements;
• Clear planning of the bidding process so that the exchange of information between procurement participants is as difficult as possible;
• Communicating information to employees about possible fraudulent activities;
• Analysis and monitoring of the market;
• High qualification of employees and its constant improvement;
• Improvement of legislative norms, including the separation of fraud and crimes in the field of public procurement as a separate corpus delicti.