A few days before the elections are due, whoever is Minister of Public Affairs decides “urgently” that the ministry does not have the required infrastructure to support the elections' broadcast and this must be assigned to a private company. By diabolical coincidence, the only firm interested in a job worth millions of euros seems to be Singular Logic, which simply submits its proposal and undertakes the work without ever facing a competitor. As we will see below, this admittedly opaque procedure is allowed by law, while the public contracts of Singular Logic are not subject to any kind of control.

Who is Singular Logic

Singular Logic is an informatics giant, member of Marfin Investment Group. It emerged from the union of three companies: Singular, LogicDIS and Delta. From the latter it “inherited” the steady assignment of broadcasting the election results. In its clientele, one can find banks, telecommunications companies, well-known private companies. However, its best client is the Greek state.

It has undertaken the realization of more than 70 public contracts related to information systems. These contracts are funded by the Ministry of Public Affairs, the Ministry of Administrative Reform, the Ministry of Finance, the Ministry of Justice as well as the Ministry of Education. The total amount that Singular Logic has been paid by the state treasury for services provided, seems to exceed the sum of 50 million euros. However, its most reliable funding source are the elections.

Elections mean Singular

Since 1981 and to date, the company has been covering all the electoral battles that have taken place (32 in total) and it has generously been rewarded for its services by the state treasury. More specifically, should we examine, one by one, the ministerial decrees of the last six years that have been published in the internet, we find out that:

In 2012 the company got: 3,013,500€ for the elections of May and 2,152,500€ for the elections of June, a sum that exceeds 5.1 million euros. Additionally, a note on the elections of May states that the amount paid was 20% less than the money paid in the 2009 elections. Hence, it can be deduced that in 2009, Singular received around 3.6 million euros.

For the triple elections of 2014, i.e. the local elections of May 18 and their iterative as well as the European Parliament elections a week after (May 25), it received a total of 3.813 million euros.

For the elections of January 25, 2015, Singular Logic received 3,136,500€, and for the July referendum it received 2,398,500€.

The procedure followed and described by ministerial decrees is extremely simple. Singular puts forth a proposal for the amount it wishes to receive, knowing beforehand that there will be an agreement. The state accepts and the deal is closed. Apparently, the prices may fluctuate as one wishes. For example, the 2009 general elections cost 3.6 million euros while in 2012 the amount decreased but in 2015 it augmented again. Additionally, the referendum, a procedure involving simple data (yes/no) proved to be more expensive than general elections (with parties, candidates, preferences of specific candidates etc.). Under the excuse of an urgent procedure, there is neither a contest, nor a price negotiation. Studying the Ministerial decrees for the elections of January 2015 it seems that some form of negotiation took place, when Singular initially asked for 2.7 million euros but, later, came back with a lower offer (2.55 million euros pre VAT), which was accepted.

The obscure points

All ministerial decrees state that Singular has been undertaking every electoral procedure since 1981. It is thus implied that it possesses the know-how of realizing such an enterprise better than anyone else. Indeed, such an argument is grounded and seems decisive. However, there are unanswered questions that we ought to pose:

i) A financial monopoly like that can cause grave negative consequences. Although we cannot express an opinion about the quality of Singular's services, the question about the cost is valid. Who guarantees that the amounts Singular receives by the Greek state are proportional to the services it offers?

ii) Why are there no open contests held for companies who might wish to undertake such public contracts? One could claim that in cases of unforeseen elections the above is impossible. Even if this argument is valid, directly assigning a public contract to a private company does not mean that the candidate must be unique nor does it mean that the contractor will always be the same. There are also a lot of electoral battles with a predefined time, such as the parliamentary elections at the end of a four year administration, the local elections and the European elections. In those cases, there is no excuse for avoiding a transparent open contest.

iv) In a free market environment, it is curious that no other company, with the appropriate know-how, is not willing to undertake a contract worth millions of euros and does not submit a more favorable offer to the Greek state as far as its quality and price is concerned.

It is paradoxical that such a preferential treatment that Singular enjoys has been covered by law. More specifically, in article 130 of the presidential decree 26/2012 (which essentially is the continuation of many previous ones: that of 1999, that of 2003 and that of 2007), the procedure of a direct assignment regarding anything related to the elections is explicitly allowed. Not only that, but the lawmaker had also the “foresight” to include apart from the general elections, the local ones as well as any other voicing of the people's verdict (that is, European elections and referenda). What is even more surprising is that, as allowed, the legislation in force is circumvented concerning these decrees and there is no need for any form of authorization or control. This practice is unprecedented for such costly contracts between private companies and the state. This provision is the best ally of Singular. On the one hand, it protects against the exposure to “disagreeable” competition. On the other hand, it provides Singular with absolute freedom to over-invoice (if it wishes so, however it wishes) the services it offers, knowing that nobody will ever have the right to check whether these contracts are indeed the most favorable for the Greek state.

Unknowingly or knowingly, a company ends up having established an electoral “cartel” with all the negative consequences this practice carries. In Greece, we have managed to have a “national contractor” even for the elections…

This publication has been produced within the partnership with Osservatorio Balcani e Caucaso for the European Centre for Press and Media Freedom (ECPMF), co-funded by the European Commission. The contents of this publication are the sole responsibility of IPS Communication Foundation and can in no way be taken to reflect the views of the European Union.