The Generalitat has once again entrusted Agtic Consulting with the audit of future elections to the Catalan chambers of commerce, which have not yet been held. Not even the decree that should regulate the voting has been published and everything indicates that it could be postponed until next September.
Agtic was already the auditor of the controversial 2019 votes, which in Barcelona gave a large majority to the Eines de País independence candidacy. Agtic’s choice occurred then after the large audit firms, such as Deloitte, Price, KPMG and EY, gave up participating in the contest called for this by the Catalan Government. These were the first elections held with electronic voting, which will also be used in future ones.
The new audit contract is awarded for a total of 92,637.60 euros (VAT included), almost 12% more than in 2019. In its resolution, the Department of Business explains that the term for the submission of offers has already closed last December 13 and a few days later the envelope was opened with the only proposal. that of Agtic Consulting.
The role of this audit firm in the previous elections has been questioned in several of the lawsuits filed against the electoral procedure after the wide victory of the pro-independence Eines de País candidacy in Barcelona. Last July, the Supreme Court (TS) dismissed the last appeals of the Generalitat and the General Council of Chambers of Catalonia and confirmed the nullity of the decree that regulated the electoral process in 2019. Staff Pavillion, the plaintiff company, initiated the judicial process with an appeal that questioned the legality of the decree process, because in its processing the authorities skipped the citizen participation process, something that led the Superior Court of Justice of Catalonia (TSJC) to declare it null in March 2020.
Although in theory the elections would be invalidated, the Supreme Court ruling has not had any impact on the government of the Barcelona Chamber of Commerce, chaired by Mònica Roca who has continued to exercise normally. The proximity of an upcoming electoral call has mitigated the pressure to carry out the sentence.
