Printing money

Collusion in the private sector is as deleterious to effective competition as corruption inside the government sector. Both undermine faith in good government.

Consider this report from Ghana:

Intelligence picked up by The Herald have revealed that the US$50 million 2010 Population and Housing Census and the GH¢35million 2010 District Assembly Election organized by the Ghana Statistical Service and the Electoral Commission respectively failed due to the existence of a mafia within the commercial printing industry, called the Big Six.

They hold meetings where figures are cooked and decisions made as to which of the companies should win the contract and share it amongst the groups to execute. Most often, the Public Procurement Authority, which by the public procurement law, is to give approval before these jobs are executed, is ignored by the state agencies.

Insiders in the printing industry, the Controller and Accountant General’s Department, and the Electoral Commission informed The Herald that the companies have strategically positioned themselves with state agencies which do huge volumes of commercial printing.

Deliberate delays are created to avoid any competitive tendering processes during the award of the huge printing jobs hence there are no advertisements in the newspapers as specified by public procurement law, and this enables the printing jobs to be awarded under a cloak of emergency.