Opposition: because of the National Stadium, the mayor of Vilnius is forced to call an extraordinary meeting – MadeinVilnius.lt

The opposition of the city of Vilnius managed to get the majority of the Council, led by Mayor Valdas Benkunskas, to return to the issue of the construction of the National Stadium. The opposition’s signatures were enough to register a request to convene an extraordinary meeting of the city council at the Secretariat of the Vilnius City Council. In the opinion of the opposition, the city government completely ignores the negative conclusions of the Public Procurement Service regarding the “Multifunctional Health, Education, Education, Culture and Employment Promotion Complex”.

Two issues are on the agenda of the extraordinary meeting, which is being called this Friday. The “Freedom and Justice” faction of the Vilnius Council registered drafts of the Council’s decision proposing to start negotiations on the takeover of the company implementing the National Stadium by organizing separate international public procurements, thus dividing the construction of the object into parts and successfully implementing it in parts.

“We have prepared drafts of the Council’s decisions, which, above all, would invalidate the decision “Regarding the implementation of the project “Multifunctional complex for the promotion of health, education, education, culture and employment” adopted in February of this year. Secondly, the director of the Vilnius city municipality administration would be obliged to initiate negotiations on the 2021 October 8 Termination of the concession contract due to the fault of the company implementing the Project, demanding compensation for losses and damages and taking control of the complex. A new tender for the construction and installation of a stadium with 18,000 stationary seats would also be announced,” says opposition leader Artūras Zuokas.

According to the opposition, the conclusions of the Public Procurement Service clearly indicate that the amendments to the Concession Agreement adopted this year are not possible, as the economic balance of the parties to the agreement was violated, and the risk of indexation was exclusively transferred to the shoulders of the municipality.

“A critical remark was that the indexation was also done for already completed works, although court practice prohibits this type of indexation. In response to this, we believe that the interests of the municipality were completely unrepresented when making the above-mentioned changes, therefore the decision of the council, which approved the changes to the Concession Agreement, must be changed,” said Vydūnas Sadauskas, elder of the “Freedom and Justice” faction.

The public procurement service showed obvious errors in the calculations of the municipal administration, which, if corrected, should have saved the city at least 2 million euros, opposition representatives claim, adding that V. Benkunska’s statement that the municipality will save 25,000 euros after negotiations only shows that the mayor is negotiating not for the city, but for BaltCap and Š. Steponavičius. However, at the extraordinary meeting of the Vilnius council, the opposition hopes that the council members will use the opportunity to prove that they represent the interests of the people of Vilnius and that the capital city can build an 18,000-seat stadium at a fair price.