The average amount of bribes paid in the process of winning contracts or attracting subsidies in Slovakia is 13 percent of the contract value, according to a recent poll carried out by lobbying group the Business Alliance of Slovakia (PAS) over the past four weeks and published on Wednesday, September 19. According to the results of the anonymous survey among 425 businessmen, the more sophisticated the product or service purchased, the higher the probability of corruption.

"It's easier to hide extra payments and it's more difficult to reveal them in the case of complicated products, which are often adjusted to the individual requirements of the buyers," said PAS executive director Róbert Kičina, as quoted by the TASR newswire. When it comes to public procurement, many businesspeople are discouraged by a general conviction that companies with good ties to state officials are preferred irrespective of quality. This is the impression of two businessmen out of three, with 12 percent thinking that contacts are more important than the quality of the supplier in Slovakia.

"Respondents think that the biggest risk of corruption prevails at ministries, in institutions providing money from structural funds, other central state administration bodies, regional governments, courts and prosecutors’ offices. Conversely, the lowest level of corruption is in relationships with private companies, private health-care facilities, private schools and private health insurers," said Kičina.

Source: TASR

Compiled by Zuzana Vilikovská from press reports
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