It remains a secret how the purchase of the fighter jet came about

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Middle federal councilor Viola Amherd (60)’s defense service VBS does not want to give details. Absolutely not. As early as August 2021, a journalist had asked the Federal Armaments Bureau (Armasuisse) for insight into the assessment criteria based on the Disclosure Act.

A good month later, a request for a noise measurement report for the new American F-35 fighter jet was submitted to the Swiss Federal Laboratories for Materials Testing and Research (Empa) – to no avail.

The Federal Administrative Court came to the same conclusion in the two judgments published on Thursday. Both Armasuisse and Empa were allowed to refuse access to the documents. When purchasing armaments, the legislator has placed confidentiality above the transparency requirement that otherwise applies to tenders.

Confidentiality more important than transparency

The two lower courts had rightly referred to a reservation in the Government Information (Public Access) Act. This states that the principle of public access to official federal documents may be deviated from if special provisions of other federal laws provide for a different arrangement.

Such a provision is present in the Federal Public Procurement Act (BöB) or in the old version of the BöB which is authoritative here. The purchase of weapons, ammunition or war material and the construction of buildings for the combat and command infrastructure of the general defense and the army are not covered by the Public Procurement Act.

This means that the rules to ensure transparency, cost-effectiveness and competition in the award of contracts by the federal government do not apply to such transactions. On the contrary, according to the statements of the Federal Administrative Court, arms orders can be issued in so-called invitation procedures.

Safety in Switzerland is more important

This deprives competitors of the opportunity to file a complaint against a particular award. However, this serves to increase confidentiality, which is very important in arms deals. Switzerland’s internal and external security also outweighs the interest of the applicants and therefore the public in accessing the required documents.

According to the Federal Administrative Court, the less important public interest in the transparency of arms purchases and sometimes also in good administration in such cases can be guaranteed in other ways, namely through parliamentary oversight. (SDA)

Source:Blick