Marek is fed up with facing ever more graft in his business dealings in Prague, something he did not imagine would still be a problem so long after the wild early days of post-communist transformation two decades ago.

“A few years ago, officials went after bigger deals, now they are interested in kickbacks from every little order,” said the event management entrepreneur, who like most businesspeople interviewed for this article refused to give his full name.

As a May 28-29 general election nears, Czech media have been full of stories of suspicious contracts, from small orders to multi-billion crown deals to build highways, supply services, or buy military equipment.

The rise in sleaze has turned many Czechs off the two main established parties — the right-wing Civic Democrats and the left-wing Social Democrats — which have alternated in power and bear most responsibility.

That is likely to bring new parties into parliament which may determine the make-up of the next government.

The Czech Republic has gone through a highly successful transformation, giving its people democracy, better living standards at 80 percent of EU average, and security through integration into the European Union and NATO.

But, as in most other central and east European countries, strong institutions and good governance have been slower to evolve, resulting in a ineffective justice system unable to punish corruption and fraud.

“Unless we can fix it quickly and comprehensively, the opaque and inefficient system through which the state allocates its resources could erode the very foundation of both the free market and democracy,” Weston Stacey, head of the American Chamber of Commerce in Prague, wrote in an article last week.

“Despite all the accusations and outrage, the prosecutor’s office has been unable to put together any evidence of widespread abuse,” he added.

The chamber is leading a group of experts that has drafted a plan to improve public procurement, trying to force parties to adopt it as an agenda item for the next government.

GETTING WORSE

Last year, the country of 10.5 million people dropped seven spots to the 52nd in a ranking of perceived corruption by Transparency International, a non-profit group. That is behind its central European neighbours and most western countries.

The Czech Republic is still better placed than Bulgaria, which had 1 billion euros in E.U. development funds stopped due to endemic graft and ranks 71st on the list along with Greece and Romania as the EU’s worst performers.

But many Czech contracts are awarded without tenders; some are not published; strange conditions are set to eliminate rivals; final prices exceed those contracted; and winners often have anonymous ownership structures, raising suspicion of connections to politicians.

Jan, a Prague entrepreneur in information technology, explained how some procurement deals he saw worked.

“You create a big project with not much actually in it which costs a crazy amount of money. Award it to friends, who find someone who does the real work for a fraction of the price, and pocket the rest,” he said.

He called the projects “Zeppelins” after the giant gas-filled airships popular in the early 20th century.

An opinion poll by the CVVM agency found in March that 42 percent of Czechs believed most public officials take bribes. Another 23 percent thought nearly all take bribes.

A Czech Confederation of Industry survey found in April that 29 percent of firms thought corruption had worsened from a year ago. Only 2 percent said there had been an improvement.

The group’s chief, Jaroslav Mil, said companies reckon bribes and overpricing account for between 5 and 20 percent of the cost of contracts, adding up to billions of dollars a year.

“It has been getting worse. It has become a tolerated thing, something common,” he said.

Among deals in the spotlight is a military purchase of armoured personnel carriers worth 14.4 billion crown ($701.1 mln), which media said were three times as expensive as a similar type bought by Portugal. The defence ministry said the Czech ones have better equipment.

Vladimir Kovar, owner of a software firm, said on television he lost a state software tender despite submitting a cheaper bid than the winner after rejecting an offer by unknown lobbyists to give 20 million crowns to members of the steering committee. There have been no charges in either deal.

PRAGUE VOTERS RUN

Prague, the capital of 1.3 million people, has become a national symbol of opaque governance.

The most notorious deal criticised in the press is a contract to design passes to pay for public transport, similar to London’s Oyster card, which cost 880 million crowns ($42.84 mln) and was won by a firm whose owners were unknown.

The city leadership has denied wrongdoing, and there have been no charges against officials.

Prague had been a firm power base for the conservative Civic Democrats in the past two decades. That is over. The party won 48.3 percent in the capital in the last general election but only polled 23.5 percent in an opinion poll this month.

Citizens’ groups have sprung up to urge people to boot out the established parties. One is called simply “Exchange the politicians”. Another calls on people to select candidates from the bottom of party lists so they jump ahead of party leaders.

A new party with catchy anti-corruption rhetoric, Public Affairs, has been polling around 10 percent and may become the kingmaker in forming the next government.

A week before the election, it remains uncertain who will lead the country for the next four years.

Helena Hejdova, an architect who finds it very hard to pick who to vote for, was sceptical about whether it matters.

“There has been more and more theft; I wonder if anyone who comes next will be any better,” she said.