Lobbyists, business groups and even organized crime in the Czech Republic are interfering with public procurement, strategic decision making and personnel policy of major state owned companies in the Czech Republic, according to BIS, the Czech counter-intelligence service. Its most recent annual report gives Czech Airlines, Czech Post, Czech Railways and CD Cargo as examples of companies where un-transparent business methods could be viewed as suspicious. BIS says that the methods for holding tenders is inadequate to guarantee a genuinely competitive environment.
The report has triggered a wave of protests and denials among the listed companies, including a rebuke from Finance Minister Miroslav Kalousek, but his position has been weakened by recent investigations into allegedly over-priced and non-transparent orders by the Czech Defense Ministry.
