Fighting Bid-Rigging in Public  Procurement: The Adequacy Of The Ethiopian Law

Denekew, Adam

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dc.contributor.author	Denekew, Adam
dc.date.accessioned	2022-11-22T06:13:35Z
dc.date.available	2022-11-22T06:13:35Z
dc.date.issued	2020-10
dc.identifier.uri	http://ir.bdu.edu.et/handle/123456789/14499
dc.description.abstract	The purpose of the law – in general - is to provide incentives and disincentives that require subjects to behave desirably. As far as bid-rigging infringement is concerned, competition and procurement legislations are supposed to provide sufficient incentives inducing bidders not to participate in acts of conspiracy for limiting the outcome of a competitive tender. Bidders could participate in bid-rigging conspiracies if the disincentives provided by the law are insufficient, for the assumption of rationality in economics is workable. The key objective of this research work is therefore to examine the sufficiency of the incentives created in the Ethiopian competition and procurement laws to contain bid-rigging conspiracies in public procurement. To this end, a socio-legal research approach is employed. The examination identified the following limitations. First, for the following three reasons, public enforcement is not comprehensively recognized. Firstly, the system of fine against bid-rigging is not adequate; it does not allow determining its amount based on the nature and gravity of the offense, among others, and the basis of calculation could result over-deterrence especially for a business person operating in several lines, as annual turnover does not necessarily represent the element of illegality. Secondly, as the PPPAP and the TCCP have not been legislated intelligibly; the practicability of the criminal sanctions against bid-rigging infringements is questionable. Thirdly, the detection aspect is not effective, for there are no sufficient tools guarantying the supply of sufficient information. Second, the TCCP has unnecessarily limited the ground for private enforcement to unfair competition within the meaning of Article 8. Thus, damage arisen out of bid-rigging infringements is not actionable. Third, the procurement law has loopholes that encourage the formation and stability of cartels. Particula rly, the information disclosure rule during bid opening ceremony is problematic; for it provides the required information for the formation and stability of bid-rigging cartels. Thus, to fill all the aforementioned loopholes, the study recommended the following points. First, the provision governing administrative fines has to be amended in a way that makes individual assessment of penalty possible. To this end, a basic fine has to be developed. Again, the basis of calculation should be the sales values of the cartelized goods, not the annual turnover of the business person. Second, from the perspective of criminal sanctions, the procurement law and competition law have to be intelligible; it must be the former that should incorporate criminal sanctions attached to bid-rigging infringements. Third, for meaningful detection, a comprehensive leniency scheme has to be installed. Fourth, the ground for private action of compensation has to be broadened, thus violations of the rule on horizontal agreements must be actionable. Lastly, the procurement law has to be revisited in discouraging the formation and stability of bid-rigging cartels. Particularly, parsimonious disclosure of information has to be adopted.	en_US
dc.language.iso	en	en_US
dc.subject	Law	en_US
dc.title	Fighting Bid-Rigging in Public Procurement: The Adequacy Of The Ethiopian Law	en_US
dc.type	Thesis	en_US