By: Norma Villalobos
The purpose of the approved law is to establish the regulations, requirements, and conditions, which have an essential purpose in the structuring, selection, awarding, contracting, and execution of public works projects of the Ministry of Public Works and Transportation (MOPT), which contains as a particularity, the inclusion of financing, to execute the design, construction, supervision and even, in certain cases, the operation and maintenance of the public work in question.
Among the main provisions contained in the law are the following:
- The public works executed under the Law will be financed with resources from national or foreign financial entities, or legally constituted private corporations, or with the contractor’s own funds, which must be defined by the bidder when submitting its technical and economic offer for the work and must include a financial offer proposal to be analyzed by the Ministry of Finance.
- The MOPT will be responsible for defining the contracting instruments, the minimum accreditation documents of the bidders, the requirements to be evaluated and the development of the public works project in its different stages.
- A Multidisciplinary Technical Commission is created to be appointed by the highest authority of the MOPT, which will be responsible for evaluating the bids and issuing the recommendation to the highest authority.
- The highest authority of the MOPT, prior to issuing and communicating the result of the procurement process, must have received the notification from the Ministry of Finance, in which it will communicate that, based on the financing conditions analyzed, the contracting of this is appropriate or not, and subsequently the MOPT will notify the bidder by means of a reasoned resolution of the result of the process, awarding it or declaring it void.
- The highest authority of the MOPT may exceptionally authorize the non-generation of competition through a reasoned resolution, based on the nature of the contracting, the priority needs and the specific unique conditions of the market.
- Each bidder participating in a contracting process of a public work shall submit the financial offer, which shall indicate the source of financing foreseen, the conditions thereof in terms of term, grace period, if applicable, interest rate, periodicity of payments, and other conditions.
- Once the result of the award is communicated by the MOPT, the Ministry of Finance will carry out the process of contracting the financing for the public works, complying with the applicable provisions.
- The resources of the financing contract for the public work will be used by the MOPT for payment to the contractor and the debt will be paid by the Ministry of Finance to the entity providing the financing resources or to the Contractor when the latter is the one providing the resources.
- Due to the nature of the public works contracting that includes the financing, the verification of the budget allocation will not be required prior to the beginning of the contracting procedure.
- The companies contracted within the framework of this law, as well as their subcontractors, will enjoy the tax exemptions provided by said law until the final reception of the work.
- The President of the Republic shall issue the General Regulations of the law.
- The Ministry of Finance and the MOPT are empowered to issue agreements, instructions, circulars, resolutions, or any type of administrative instrument to guarantee and make the application of the law viable.
This Law became effective 8 days after its publication in the Official Gazette No. 238 Volume No. 437 dated December 16, 2022.