EMS Denies Corruption Claims After Ambulance Tender Cancelled

Bratislava, 14 August (TASR) – The Emergency Medical Solutions (EMS) company has acknowledged the cancellation of the tender for operating emergency medical service stations and denies any allegations of corruption or connections to selection committee members. The company plans to comment on the legality and manner of the tender’s termination at a later time, according to a statement provided to TASR. „Some political representatives judge the situation solely based on who appears in group photos. Based on such superficial criteria, accusations of corruption involving politicians and state officials have emerged. We consider this shallow and misleading, especially given that our company has no political ties or aspirations," EMS stated. The company also firmly rejected claims regarding the number of ambulance stations it had allegedly secured in the tender. According to EMS, no politician from either opposition or ruling parties was informed in advance about its participation, with the sole exception of Andrea Letanovska from the non-parliamentary party Democrats. Letanovska, an experienced doctor, contributed as a professional guarantor in preparing the medical aspects of the project. EMS also strongly denied knowing in advance the identities of the selection committee members. „It is alarming that paramedics and emergency medicine specialists who worked on our project and have been providing services for years — including to politicians — are now being discredited by those same politicians as amateurs from a 'letterbox company', despite the publicly available history and registered address of our firm," the company noted. EMS expressed confidence that its project was among the best-quality submissions in the competition. The Emergency Medical Dispatch Centre cancelled the selection process on 13 August. The tender aimed to assess applications for licences to operate emergency medical service ambulances at 351 station locations. The cancellation followed criticism from both the opposition and the coalition party Slovak National Party. Several opposition MPs claimed that, based on unofficial results, EMS was set to be among the winning companies and raised concerns over its alleged ties to the Voice-SD party. Health Minister Kamil Sasko (Voice-SD) responded to the criticism by stating he would not allow any scandals or "rackets" to take place. He has asked the Prosecutor-General’s Office to investigate the legality of the procedures related to the tender and requested the District Court in Zilina to examine suspicions of connections between applicants or possible control of the tender by its ultimate beneficiary. mf