Spain's PP Accuses Government of 'Hand-Picked' 3-Billion-Euro Turkish Aircraft Deal

The People's Party (PP) is intensifying its parliamentary offensive regarding the contract between the Spanish Ministry of Defense and Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan for the manufacture of 45 new training aircraft for Spanish fighter and attack pilots. These aircraft will replace the current—and obsolete—F5 and T-38 models at a cost of over 3 billion euros (specifically, 3.12 billion). The PP claims the contractual relationship was formalized without a public procurement process. The Turkish Hürjet aircraft, manufactured by the state-owned defense company Turkish Aerospace Industries, are still in the development phase—meaning they have not even been built. This, in the opinion of the PP senators, requires urgent explanations from Minister Robles. They also denounce that the acquisition was made through direct contracting without a tender, which raises doubts about the transparency, economic opportunity, and technical evaluation of the agreement. PP senators, led by Alicia García, have presented a new initiative for the government of Pedro Sánchez to provide a written explanation for what they consider to be the "latest hand-picked maneuver" by the central executive. They demand confirmation that a competitive and transparent procurement procedure was followed, as required by current public acquisition regulations, and ask for the technical and strategic criteria that led the Spanish government to opt for a model of aircraft that has not yet been manufactured and, according to ABC, has not even been evaluated by the Air and Space Army.