Well that is why you have a public bidding process where you throughly document why the winning bid won. If they had nothing to hide, that part of the equation

Well that is why you have a public bidding process where you throughly document why the winning bid won. If they had nothing to hide, that part of the equation would be perfectly transparent. I work in the public sector in Scandinavia and while I realize our laws are a little different, I would be in jail if I did something similar. Getting contracts to friends/family is a huge issue in most countries, which is why you document the reasoning even harder to make sure its absolutely bulletproof legally when they happen to have the best bid.