AN honest senior civil servant once described bid-rigging with a simple but powerful analogy: the government orders a motorcycle, receives a bicycle, yet pays the price of a car.
This illustrates how public procurement can be manipulated, resulting in inflated prices, poor-quality delivery and the waste of taxpayers money.
Bid-rigging is not merely a procurement irregularity. It is a form of collusion that undermines fair competition, compromises public accountability and can facilitate corruption.
Malaysia allocated RM81 billion for federal development expenditure for this year, rising to RM83 billion the next.
