Local Senior Expert on Public Procurement Offences

Background:
As part of the strategic documents of Albania, such as the National Anti-Corruption Strategy 2024–2030 and its Action Plan 2024–2026, Rule of Law Roadmap and others, Albanian authorities aim to strengthen transparency, integrity and accountability in high-risk sectors such as procurement, tax, customs, health and education. One of the key components of these efforts is a better understanding and clarity of the legal framework on public procurement, with a particular focus on investigation and adjudication of public procurement offences and increasing knowledge and strengthening legal practice, ensuring compliance with national and international legal standards and promoting transparency and accountability. Implementation of public procurement requires more precise and structured guidelines, with a particular distinction between the administrative violation and criminal offence. For this reason, the School of Magistrates, as one of the main partners of the Presence, established a working group comprised of representatives of the SoM, SPAK, General Prosecution Office and PPA which will work on the development of the manual. The project seeks to engage a local senior legal expert who will provide the expert support in the development of the manual.

Objective of Assignment: 
The primary objective of this assignment is to develop the Manual on investigation and adjudication of public procurement offences.

Duration of Assignment:
This consultancy is envisaged to last for a period of 2 months, during May-June 2025.

Tasks and Responsibilities:

The local senior procurement expert will work in close collaboration with the Working group members, including the School of Magistrates, Public Procurement Agency, General Prosecutor’s Officer and SPAK and be responsible for the following tasks:

1. Desk research/review 
•    Review existing national legal framework on criminal and administrative offences, in particular in relation to procurement offences/violations;
•    Review of judicial practice in prosecution of criminal offences in relation to public procurement offences.

2. Develop the Methodologic Framework
•    Draft the structure of the Manual on investigation and adjudication of public procurement offences, including, non-exhaustive:
-    the methodological approach/models on investigation and adjudication of public procurement offences. 
-    identification of risk factors and their analysis to assess the impact on procurement cycle, description and examples of key indicators based on the national procurement framework and practices.

3. Working group participation and collaboration
•    Participate in at least 80% of working group meetings to provide input and feedback on the proposed methodological approach, essential comments towards the Manual and reflect them in the final deliverable;
•    Collaborate with working group members to ensure the incorporation of inputs, finalisation of the Manual and endorsement of the final deliverable by the working group members.

Deliverables:
1. Development of the structure of the Manual on investigation and adjudication of public procurement offences by 15 May 2025.
2. Drafting of the Manual on investigation and adjudication of public procurement offences, reflecting comments from PiA, in word document by 10 June 2025. 
3. Participation in at least 80% the working group meetings.
4. Finalization of Manual on investigation and adjudication of public procurement offences by 30 June 2025.

Necessary Qualifications:

•    Advanced university degree in law; 
•    A minimum of ten years of experience as a judge or prosecutor dealing with investigation and/or adjudication of criminal offences in the area of anti-corruption, public procurement or other criminal offences;

•    Previous experience in drafting assessments, evaluation reports and research conducted in public procurement area, related to policy implementation, legal reviews, risk assessment, integrity, etc. 
•    Ability to work and deliver under tight deadlines;
•    Excellent communication, presentation and legal drafting skills in the Albanian and English language;
•    Computer literate with professional experience in Microsoft applications and familiarity with online platforms such as Zoom.

Remuneration Package:

Remuneration will be based on the selected consultant's/expert's qualifications, experience, the tasks and deliverables for this position and in accordance with the OSCE established rates.

If you wish to apply for this position, please use the OSCE's online application link found under https://vacancies.osce.org/.

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Only those candidates who are selected to participate in the subsequent stages of recruitment will be contacted.

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