The Buenos Aires Ministry of Education Bought Three Cars without Justifying Their Purpose
It was during fiscal year 2006 and in the amount of $ 291 thousand. The General Audit of the City of Buenos Aires analyzed the execution of a program to acquire educational equipment, and concluded that there is no procurement forecast in the Portfolio. It was also detected a tender in which different prices were paid for the same chalkboards.
In 2006, the Ministry of Education of the City of Buenos Aires purchased three cars for $ 291,255 without justifying the need for the expense. A report from the Buenos Aires Audit Office (AGCBA, for its acronym in Spanish) notes that the portfolio does not have an annual procurement plan and that operations are carried out in a "continuous and successive manner, without adequate programming throughout the year."
The control agency examined the implementation of Program 84 for the purchase of educational equipment. The program began in 2006 with a current credit of $ 5,347,392 and a definitive item of $3,920,687, of which, according to the Investment Account of that year, earned $3,784,862. However, the AGCBA separated from this total the operations that were done by decree 1370/01, which allows urgent expenses without calling for a tender, and took a sample of 21 transactions for a value of $ 1,336,627.34.
Among the operations analyzed, two cases stand out in which it was not possible to determine the modality applied to make the hiring, which totaled $ 344,591. That is to say, the money was spent, although it is not known whether it was through a call for tenders or decree 1370. In addition, the Audit verified that in Private Tender 496 "equal movable property was acquired at different prices": was when the Ministry Of Education bought eight chalkboards of the same model and paid two units for $ 178 each, while for the remaining six he spent $ 298 each.
On the other hand, the AGCBA had a "limitation to its task," because the education portfolio officials did not report how the total amount accrued in Program 84 was complied with. In addition, the observations made in the report, approved in October 2008, allowed the Audit to conclude that the "absence of an annual procurement plan" is a "serious internal control failure."