Our target was the Czech national character that shaped 45 years of communism. The era when politicians dictated people what to think. And every disobedience was heavily punished. The authoritarianism of the government survives to this day. And such environment is great for corruption. Ministry of Transportation made an extremely overpriced contract to build an e-commerce platform worth 16000000 EUR without an open bid. The anticorruption group Znamkamarada decided to act. They organized a public Anticorruption Hackathon to build this platform during 48 hours for free. That put the whole country and the faith in democracy back on its feet.

Politicians in the Czech Republic got used to think that they can get away with almost everything. The last drop on the list of corruption scandals was an overpriced e-shop for a highway vignettes. The contract for Asseco group to build an e-commerce platform (for selling highway vignettes) was worth 16 000 000 EUR without an open bid. This extremely overpriced contract got attention of the anticorruption group called Znamkamarada who made an open call and organized the anticorruption hackathon. They invited programmers from whole country to build the e-commerce platform in 48h and for free, in order to show how ridiculous the overpriced contract is.

The creative idea was to fight the corrupted system very straightforward and very public and visible way. We could not stand up to the government as individuals, but as a legitimate representatives of public. We organized Anticorruption Hackathon and made an open call to IT specialists from whole country. They could join and create the platform for free during 48 hours. 194 coders came to make this happen. Whole country was watching and government had to react.

Tomas Vondracek (representing Znamkamarada group) made a call to action via LinkedIn post as a reaction to overpriced contract. He made an open call for volunteers from IT and announced to build together a solution to show that 16 000 000 EUR is ridiculously overpriced. Moreover, the hackathon took place in Prague and lasted 48 hours.

His post got attention to thousands of relevant people from the field, and moreover attracted the media and attention of Prime Minister within couple of hours. Prime Minister after that called for a meeting. Politicians in the Czech Republic never talked to ordinary people before, talking into consideration their opinions.

The anticorruption hackathon Znamkamarada challenged the suspicious and overpriced contract for 16 000 000 EUR to build an e-commerce platform (for selling highway vignettes). To prove their point, they made an open call for IT volunteers to build the system by themselves in 48 hours and for free. The story attracted all media and therefore the whole country was nonstop watching the whole event.

Prime minister called for meeting.

Minister of Transportation was fired.

New law for IT contracts was created.

Similar activities from another groups challenging other issues followed.

The state contract in the amount of EUR 16 000 000 was canceled.

The contract was then re-announced and purchased for EUR 5 000 000.

Total savings of taxpayers' funds - EUR 11 000 000

Czech society has been fighting the stigma of 45 years of communism. We gave people, who thought that have no power over the corrupted system, strong voice that needed to be heard. We gave them a powerful tool and showed them a way how they can change things that are not working for their good.