Illegal public tenders in deals worth 30 million in Lisbon gardens (and Margarida Martins is one of those targeted)
Five companies from the same family won 355 public tenders. Many have been broken up to allow for direct awards. Court of Auditors denounces violation of the law and points out “use and abuse of direct adjustments” in one of the parishes of Lisbon, Arroios
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It is a kind of monopoly with several contracts with parish councils in Lisbon – and with entities led by former employees of the City Council. Five companies belonging to the same family have raised more than 30 million euros in public contracts in recent years. In all, there are 355 contracts, almost all by direct award, for garden maintenance. These deals related to the mandate of Fernando Medina.
Contract data were verified by TVI (of the same group as CNN Portugal) on the public procurement portal. The parish councils of Arroios, Avenidas Novas, Areeiro or Belém are some of the examples, as well as contracts with the Sports and Youth Institute, a public body led by Vítor Pataco, who has already studied at the Lisbon City Council, and by Sónia Paixão, who in her curriculum has experience as department director also at the City Council.
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All in family
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Analyzing in detail who the partners of these companies are, it is clear that this is a family business. From the outset, LX Garden, a company owned by Fernando Alho, by his wife and son; the son’s Parks and Gardens; Alfaia Verde, again from the complete family; Momentos Floridos and Espaços Verdes, again companies in the sphere of the Garlic family.
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Same surnames, same family, investigated in an audit by the Court of Auditors. The report confirms that “the contracts show legal representatives with close family relationships”.
One of the revealing examples of how contracts were made outside the law. Starting with the Junta de Arroios. Green spaces are the direct responsibility of Margarida Martins, who, as president of the Arroios council, made contracts for the management of green spaces as contracts. It ended up caught by this audit of the Court of Auditors that TVI had access to.
This court has no doubts about how the then mayor “uses and abuses direct adjustments”. It’s a kind of scheme to get around the public procurement law. For example, for the maintenance of a garden, with a budget of more than 137,000 euros: as this value exceeds 75,000 euros, the limit to which it is possible to make a direct adjustment, Margarida Martins divides the green space into two lots and launches two different contests. The expense is also divided: 68,900 euros for one lot and 68,800 euros for another. “The fact that they are two areas of the same parish does not mean that they are the same object, and the proximity of the areas object of intervention is also noteworthy”, concludes the Court of Auditors. In this way, a board manages to adjudicate to adjust the right an intervention that should have been the subject of a public tender.
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The illegality that is clear in the report’s properties. “It appears that it splits the expense so as not to reach the threshold beyond which the public tender is mandatory. The division of the contract into lots is prohibited”.
When questioned by the Court of Auditors, then president of Arroios, she confirms that “a parish council replicated the contracting model used by the municipality of lisbon, of contracting by lots.” Fernando Medina did not respond to TVI’s request for clarification.
The same ends up gaining that “there was, thus, a violation of public contracting rules, which is liable to generate financial responsibility” and that “the intention to try to circumvent the law, evading a more solemn procedure, is evidenced”. After this was sent to the Public Prosecutor’s Office, a former local authority continued to hire these companies.
Margarida Martins did not accept the interview request. Those responsible for companies are also silent.
Audit followed to the Public Ministry
The audit by the Court of Auditors that oversees the Parish Council of Arroios was based on two complaints from 2018, one of them anonymous, analyzing the years from 2015 to 2018.
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“The Parish Council of Arroios does not have a transparent and competitive management in the context of public procurement”, said the Court, which clearly concludes for the violation of the Public Contracts Code through the fractioning of tenders, to which adds “the fact that the contracts evidence of legal representatives with close family relationships ”
The report of the Court of Auditors was sent to the Public Ministry.