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Recently, the head of Samruk-Kazyna Construction JSC Maulen Aimanbetov and the Chairman of the Financial Monitoring Agency Dmitry Malakhov signed a memorandum of co-operation. The essence of the document is to work together to control the spending of budget funds allocated for the implementation of the national project ‘Comfortable School’.

JSC ‘Samruk-Kazyna Construction’ as a single directorate, responsible for the delivery of schools, strives for transparency in its activities and is ready to co-operate. However, the news about the signing of the memorandum was perceived in some media and social networks as an already existing fact of violation and the beginning of inspection, which is not true at all.

The Memorandum is a result of common interests, as the targeted use of funds, prevention of embezzlement and corruption offences, as well as artificial overestimation of the cost of schools is a priority task for both the Agency and ‘Samruk-Kazyna Construction’. Therefore, the parties expressed their readiness to work together in this direction and provide full support to each other.

During the meeting with AFM management, Maulen Aimanbetov, Chairman of the Board of Samruk-Kazyna Construction Joint Stock Company, spoke in detail about the status of the national project implementation and the measures taken to prevent the above-mentioned violations.

The first and most important measure is digitalisation. In this matter, the information system ‘E-Qurylys’ is a requirement not only of time, but also of legislation. Therefore, on 13 May 2024, the document flow of the national project ‘Comfortable School’ was completely transferred to the electronic format.

Since February, the company had the opportunity to accept the first acts on paper. However, the goal of a complete transition to electronic document management was set. It took about 3 months to achieve this, but in the end the goal was achieved.

All processes are digitised in the information system. Therefore, deviations from the project and acceptance of uncompleted works are not allowed. Acts of completed works are automatically generated on the basis of completed work logs, concealed works acts, photo materials and other important documents previously uploaded to the system. If any document is missing, the act is not formed and not signed. Signing is possible only by EDS. This minimises the risks of corruption and ‘informal relationships’.

‘In the construction sector Samruk-Kazyna Construction is the first in the country to switch to the ‘E-Qurylys’ system. If the terms of signing acts on paper were 5-7 days, the system takes 1-3 days. Today all problematic issues concerning the system have been completely solved. ‘E-Qurylys’ works properly without failures. Those contracting organisations that have a desire to work in the IS are quickly trained and close electronic certificates of completed works,’ Aimanbetov noted.

Samruk-KazynaConstruction JSC jointly with RSE Gosexpertiza during the inspection and analysis of 100 design and construction projects did not allow the cost of school projects to rise by 16.5%, saving about 100 billion budget tenge. Thanks to the specialists of the Directorate and Gosexpertiza, the potential burden on the budget decreased from 900 billion to 446 billion tenge.

‘In the projects, the products of Kazakhstani manufacturers are used as much as possible. Inert and most of the construction materials are used domestically produced. Roofing and facade materials are also fully Kazakhstani-made. At the same time, priority is given to local plants and factories producing the necessary materials and goods for the construction of comfortable schools in the region. Thus, today the share of TNA in the national project averages 70 per cent’, - said the head of Samruk-Kazyna Construction JSC.

Chairman of AFM Dmitry Malakhov noted that the President of the country in his Address to the people of Kazakhstan paid special attention to improving the quality of secondary education and creating decent conditions for education and comprehensive development of the younger generation. Therefore, the parties are ready to work together to ensure transparency and targeted use of budget funds.

Most importantly, the country's management and authorised bodies have full access to all documentation in electronic format. Supervisory authorities will be able to log in and check the required documents at any time. This, above all, prevents corruption. Since the project has the status of ‘pilot’, the new system is being tested to ensure transparency in the construction of not only comfortable schools, but also other social and commercial facilities in the future.

Moreover, in autumn last year during the inspection of the design and construction plans of the comfortable schools Samruk-Kazyna Construction specialists revealed overestimation of the estimated cost by 1.3-2 times. The reason for this was incompetence of design organisations and thirst for super profit on the part of contractors.

In autumn 2023, all projects were brought into compliance with the USN, i.e. cost optimisation was carried out. This also took several months. However, tremendous work was done to reduce the estimated cost of schools below the consolidated estimated standards.