The Slovak National Highway Company (NDS) announced a competition to hire an independent expert who would check and oversee the company that operates Slovakia’s electronic toll system, SkyToll, so that if SkyToll fails to fulfil its contractual conditions, the state could then impose sanctions, according to the daily Sme’s website.
The NDS is willing to pay the expert up to €32.5 million for twelve years of work but the cheapest offer would win according to the tender. According to Sme, the NDS excluded two cheaper offers for the electronic toll system stating that those consortiums could not collect the toll as effectively as they promised with the offered price.
“It seems to me illogical that companies were sacked from the competition with the reasoning that they cannot secure it properly, and then we will have to pay more for a control mechanism,” opposition SDKÚ deputy Ivan Štefanec said, as quoted by Sme.
The controversy is not a trivial issue as the European Commission has launched a case against Slovakia in connection with the electronic toll, Miroslav Beblavý of the Slovak Governance Institute said. The winning and the most expensive offer in the tender, SkyToll’s offer, exceeded the lowest offer made by Slovakpass by about €200 million, the Sme daily wrote on its webpage. Sme
Compiled by Zuzana Vilikovská from press reports
The Slovak Spectator cannot vouch for the accuracy of the information presented in its Flash News postings.
