Getting into politics?

[Jan Claeys]

Op zondag 18-01-2009 om 00:08 uur [tijdzone +0100], schreef Szilveszter
Farkas:
> Please let me introduce you the situation in Hungary. Last year the  
> government signed a 4-year, 25 + 10 billion HUF (more than 165M USD)  
> deal with Microsoft for licensing proprietary software covering the  
> government, all state offices, universities, schools, students and  
> teachers (yes, it covers almost the whole nation). This deal got some  
> attention by the international media, but only because of "the egging  
> of Steve Ballmer" at a Hungarian university: http://www.google.com/search?q=egg%20Ballmer
> 
> The deal was brought to justice by the Hungarian "Economy Competition  
> Office" because the exact wording of the tender (that was won by  
> Microsoft and its retailers) said: "Microsoft or equal software" - it  
> goes against any common sense (and I'm pretty sure even some laws) to  
> name a company in a tender by the government. But the court said it  
> was okay.
> 
> Now, a few days ago another tender of the same value (25 billion HUF,  
> around 120M USD) was announced, and we were not surprised to see the  
> exact same wording like last year.
> 
> So a bunch of people and businesses, who are involved with FLOSS in  
> Hungary, plan to write an open letter to the prime minister  
> questioning him about the situation. Is it okay for a LoCo to sign a  
> letter like this? Or we should rather keep working, and avoid any  
> political issues?

At least the individual members could sign it, and IMO if everybody
agrees, the LoCoTeam could sign it too.

> I really hope you could help us with some ideas about the situation...  
> We're a bit desperate, because we see other European governments  
> switching to FLOSS solutions, and ours locking itself into the  
> proprietary world even more.

As Hungary is a member of the EU, they have to follow the EU rules, so
you should also contact Neelie Kroes[1] who works on the MS antitrust
case and whoever is in charge for fair competition for government
contracts (internal market, it seems[2]).

Of course, having questions asked about this in the EP might be good
too.


Some relevant parts from Directive 2004/18/EC [3]:

      * "(8) Before launching a procedure for the award of a contract,
        contracting authorities may, using a technical dialogue, seek or
        accept advice which may be used in the preparation of the
        specifications provided, however, that such advice does not have
        the effect of precluding competition."
      * "(29) The technical specifications drawn up by public purchasers
        need to allow public procurement to be opened up to competition.
        To this end, it must be possible to submit tenders which reflect
        the diversity of technical solutions. Accordingly, it must be
        possible to draw up the technical specifications in terms of
        functional performance and requirements, and, where reference is
        made to the European standard or, in the absence thereof, to the
        national standard, tenders based on equivalent arrangements must
        be considered by contracting authorities. To demonstrate
        equivalence, tenderers should be permitted to use any form of
        evidence. Contracting authorities must be able to provide a
        reason for any decision that equivalence does not exist in a
        given case. Contracting authorities that wish to define
        environmental requirements for the technical specifications of a
        given contract may lay down the environmental characteristics,
        such as a given production method, and/or specific environmental
        effects of product groups or services. They can use, but are not
        obliged to use appropriate specifications that are defined in
        eco-labels, such as the European Eco-label, (multi-)national
        eco-labels or any other eco-label providing the requirements for
        the label are drawn up and adopted on the basis of scientific
        information using a procedure in which stakeholders, such as
        government bodies, consumers, manufacturers, distributors and
        environmental organisations can participate, and providing the
        label is accessible and available to all interested parties.
        Contracting authorities should, whenever possible, lay down
        technical specifications so as to take into account
        accessibility criteria for people with disabilities or design
        for all users. The technical specifications should be clearly
        indicated, so that all tenderers know what the requirements
        established by the contracting authority cover."


[1] <http://ec.europa.eu/competition/> (working on MS antitrust case)
[2] <http://ec.europa.eu/internal_market/publicprocurement/> 
[3] <http://eur-lex.europa.eu/LexUriServ/LexUriServ.do?uri=CELEX:32004L0018:EN:HTML>

-- 
Jan Claeys