Choice without choice. Or how transparent procurement turned into transparent corruption

In the third year of the full-scale invasion, the Ministry of Education and Science decided to take a fundamental approach to updating the school discipline “Defense of Ukraine.” It is planned that training will take place in special interschool spaces (cells) with all the necessary equipment: shooting simulators, training drones, first aid kits and medical mannequins.

Instead of a lesson once a week, a training format is provided for each class: children spend a whole school day in the center once a month, the subject will be taught by professional military personnel

This requires a material and technical base. To create it, the Government allocated 1.74 billion hryvnia in subventions from the state budget. If I'm not mistaken, this is a record amount for the implementation of educational reforms, even by pre-war standards. Of this amount, only 100 million will be used for the professional development of teachers in the subject “Defense of Ukraine”, and the remaining 1.64 billion UAH will be used for the purchase of equipment. In particular, they plan to purchase:

• drone control simulations;
• training shooting ranges and layouts;
• first aid kits and simulators for cardiac resuscitation, defibrillator simulator, tourniquets, etc.;
• educational kits for working with electronics, communications and 3D printing.

In fact, incorporating basic military and medical skills into the school curriculum is a great initiative! Similar things are now happening in out-of-school education.

But, unfortunately, along the way there are rakes that are hidden in the field of public procurement, which are not as transparent as they should be. Against the background of this scam by the Ministry of Education, drums for a shelter for 900 thousand hryvnia and a frying pan for 720 thousand for a school catering unit look like innocent fun

Tricky document

Let's start with the materiel, that is, documents. On May 22, 2024, signed by Oksana Lisovoy, Order No. 731 was issued “On approval of the specifics of using educational subventions from the state budget to local budgets (under a special state budget fund) to ensure the teaching of the educational subject “Defense of Ukraine.”

This Order determines the procedure for development, that is, the purchase of equipment for 1.64 billion hryvnia of state subvention.

Clause 15 of this document states that fund managers must purchase anything over 100 thousand hryvnia through an electronic catalogue. The electronic catalog is a system called Prozorro Market. At one time, the government specifically created a clone of the existing Prozorro system, which is more tolerant of various changes, innovations and corruption components. In short, this system is a corrupt official's dream. But the dog is not buried here. Kapets-kapets in another...

Choice without choice

Previously, fund managers could announce tenders, set the requirements for goods themselves and set the characteristics of these goods. The public monitored these tenders, and in case of violations, they turned on the “Alarm” mode. Anyone could take part in such auctions - offer a favorable price and win. This is how it works in the civilized world and once worked in Ukraine

But education officials have created conditions where strangers do not participate in these tenders. Only yours. Therefore, schools can select products from the Prozorro Market electronic catalog only from individual manufacturers and even a separate brand. The Ministry of Education and Science created this list of “verified companies” together with officials of the State Institution “Professional Procurement”. That is, officials quite deliberately limited the choice.

For example, the category “Interactive laser shooting simulator (shooting range)”

The minister personally writes that they will be purchased, among other things, and this will be done through Prozorro Market.

This is an expensive product that costs from 100 to 150 thousand hryvnia. Therefore, it is obvious that it will account for the lion’s share of the total purchase amounts.

If you take a closer look at the characteristics of this position on Prozorro Market, you can see an interesting detail - the software for a specific model is Defender of the Fatherland 2.1

The developer and seller of this software is a specific private company that has a patent for this software. For everyone interested - google to help

It seems that officials are planning to impose an ultimatum on the entire education system to buy a specific product from a specific company. The same situation applies to other positions.

Instead of conclusions

Everything would be fine! But order No. 731 of the Ministry of Education violates the law and the resolution of the Cabinet of Ministers. According to the Law of Ukraine “On Public Procurement” and the Resolution of the Cabinet of Ministers of Ukraine No. 1178 “On approval of the specifics of public procurement”, customers independently choose the form of procurement or open bidding (tender) or selection from a catalog (Prozorro Market). That is, imposing a specific product and a specific manufacturer is not transparent procurement, but this is transparent corruption, when billions of dollars are directed into the pockets of specific people.