The company Cegos, which the Catalan presidency ministry hired to take charge of the process of civil service entry exams - oposicions - to allow temporary Catalan government employees to become permanent civil servants, affirms that it has not received any formal communication from the Catalan government, after yesterday the minister of the presidency, Laura Vilagrà, announced that her department was terminating the contract with Cegos following the chaos experienced at last Saturday's massive examination process. Vilagrà today repeated her message about this termination, affirming that the company "seriously breached the contract" with the Catalan Generalitat and that the government is considering demanding compensation from the firm of at least one million euros for the damages caused.
Sources from the company attribute the minister's words to "speculations" made in the context of the parliamentary committee at which she had to appear today to give an explanation of the matter, and they assure that they have no intention of giving any view on the announcement of a lawsuit against Cegos because, in their opinion, "it has no legal basis". However, they warn that they reserve the right to take legal action to defend the honour and reputation of the company.
Moreover, in the face of the minister's accusations and announcements, they state that the work for which they were hired continues "at the planned rate", with the correction of the tests. In fact, they add that on the same day that the Catalan minister announced that the contract had been terminated, two representatives of the Catalan government held a working meeting at the offices of Cegos in Madrid.
Meeting
The meeting in Madrid was attended, according to company sources, by the new general director of the civil service, Anna Maria Molina, and the deputy general director of the government's Legal Advice area, Isidre Estivill. According to these same sources, during the meeting they were not informed that the work had to be stopped or that the government intended to sue them.
As to whether the government has officially communicated the termination of the contract to the company, from the communication area of Laura Vilagrà's department, the response is that they don't know and, in any case, they will provide information when there are "important things". Regarding the meeting held between the representatives of the Catalan government and the company this Thursday, the fact that it took place is confirmed, but without its content being specified.
Also on Thursday, after Vilagrà publicly appeared pointing to the company as responsible for the debacle that occurred with Saturday's exams, Cegos published a statement in which it held the Catalan government responsible for breaching "critical" tasks" that hindered the correct carryng out of the selection process. Cegos emphasized that it repeatedly warned the Catalan government of the risks that the lack of lead-time and organization could entail regarding these tasks, but it claims that the Generalitat "ignored these requests".
During her appearance in Parliament, the minister attributed the company's "tooth and nail" defence to the fact that the case could cause it to lose contracts with the Catalan government.