Financial Risk:

High

Score:

45/100

Asset Disposals

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Q24 33/100

How effective are controls over the disposal of assets, and is information on these disposals, and the proceeds of their sale, transparent?

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Controls Score: 50 / 100
Asset disposal is regulated under the law [1, 2], and there is evidence of its observation in practice [3]. The Directorate-General of Defence Resources…
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Transparency of disposal process Score: 25 / 100
Planned disposals are not known prior to publication in the Official Gazette [Diário da República], but there is extensive evidence of procedures being made…
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Transparency of financial results of disposals Score: 25 / 100
The single transparent source for financial results of disposals is the ongoing Supreme Audit Institution (SAI) audit of the Military Programming Act [1]. The…
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Q25 75/100

Is independent and transparent scrutiny of asset disposals conducted by defence establishments, and are the reports of such scrutiny publicly available?

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Scrutiny Score: 75 / 100
The Supreme Audit Institution (SAI) monitors asset disposal through its ongoing audit of the Military Programming Act. The latest available report follows the SAI…
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Independence Score: 100 / 100
SAI reports are highly critical [1, 2] and show no evidence of undue influence by the executive or the military.
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Transparency Score: 50 / 100
SAI reports are made available to the public as soon as they are completed and validated [1, 2]. These reports are released in unredacted…
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Secret Budgets

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Q26 0/100

What percentage of defence and security expenditure in the budget year is dedicated to spending on secret items relating to national security and the intelligence services?

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Score: 0 / 100
Military intelligence in Portugal centers around the Centro de Informações e Segurança Militares (CISMIL) (Military Information and Security Center), which depends on the Joint…
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Q27 0/100

Is the legislature (or the appropriate legislative committee or members of the legislature) given full information for the budget year on the spending of all secret items relating to national security and military intelligence?

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Score: 0 / 100
The Budgetary Framework Law states that budget outlays allocated to secret items are automatically nullified, and all exceptional national security expenditure is to be…
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Q28 0/100

Are audit reports of the annual accounts of the security sector (the military and intelligence services) subject to parliamentary debate?

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Comprehensiveness Score: 0 / 100
There is no evidence of audit reports being subjected to plenary debate. However, there is evidence that the NDC held hearings of the Oversight…
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Parliamentary scrutiny Score: NA / 100
This indicator is marked ‘Not Applicable’, given that Parliament has no access to actual audits, as the PRIS Oversight Committee provides limited evidence of…
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Q29 67/100

In law, are off-budget military expenditures permitted, and if so, are they exceptional occurrences that are well-controlled? In practice, are there any off-budget military expenditures? If so, does evidence suggest this involves illicit economic activity?

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Permitted exceptions Score: 50 / 100
The Constitution of the Portuguese Republic specifies a unitary budget structure to impede off-budget or confidential expenditure [1]. The Budget Framework Law provides for…
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Recording mechanisms Score: 50 / 100
Off-budget military expenditure is understood as being a part of “provisional allocations”, which may be used for national security purposes under exceptional conditions and…
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Prevalence Score: 100 / 100
While there is significant evidence of budgetary reallocation by the MoD [1], these procedures are recorded by the DGB and suggest well-controlled operations with…
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Q30 50/100

Are mechanisms for accessing information from the defence sector effective?

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Legal framework Score: 50 / 100
Access to information is regulated by the Access to Information Act [1] which is monitored by the Commission on Access to Administrative Information (CAAI).…
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Classification of information Score: NS / 100
This indicator is not assigned a score in the GDI. There is a clear regime on the classification of information [1], which is based…
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Effectiveness Score: 50 / 100
There is evidence provided by the CAAI in its annual reports [1, 2, 3, 4, 5] that defence-related institutions provide access to information by…
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Q31 50/100

Do national defence and security institutions have beneficial ownership of commercial businesses? If so, how transparent are details of the operations and finances of such businesses?

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Extent of commercial ventures Score: 50 / 100
Until June 2020, the Ministry of Defence (MoD) held beneficial ownership or shareholding positions through Empordef, a holding company specifically tailored to the defence…
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Transparency Score: 50 / 100
Defence-related enterprises operate according to the same standards of transparency and governance as any State-owned enterprise [1] and are monitored by the Supreme Audit…
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Military-owned Businesses

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Q32 50/100

Are military-owned businesses subject to transparent independent scrutiny at a recognised international standard?

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Independent scrutiny Score: 50 / 100
The Ministry of Defence holds authority over State-owned enterprises, and where applicable, scrutiny is held to the standards specified in Q31. As State-owned enterprises,…
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Transparency Score: 50 / 100
The most recent audit reports by the Court of Accounts (CA) of a business dates from 2012 [1] and other business ventures show no…
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Illegal Private Enterprise

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Q33 88/100

Is there evidence of unauthorised private enterprise by military or other defence ministry employees? If so, what is the government’s reaction to such enterprise?

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Prohibition Score: 100 / 100
Unauthorised private enterprise by the military [1] and civil [2] personnel in the defence sector (Ministry of Defence and the armed forces) is outlawed…
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Prevalence Score: 75 / 100
There is evidence that illegal private ventures occur, albeit non-systematically. A recent trial of Portuguese Air Force officers sentenced for procurement-related corruption involved 68…
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Actual Military Spending

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Q77 88/100

Is comprehensive data on actual spending on defence published during the budget year?

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Proactive publication Score: 50 / 100
Actual spending is proactively published as the State General Account [1], and it includes the defence sector [2, 3, 4, 5]. Less detailed quarterly…
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Comprehensiveness Score: 100 / 100
The State General Account report alluded to in Q77A is comprehensive, but oversight reports suggest accounting and expenditure tracking errors with regards to the…
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Timeliness Score: 100 / 100
The State General Account report is required by law to be submitted to Parliament and the Tribunal de Contas (CA) within six months [1],…
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Comparison against budget Score: 100 / 100
The State General Account audit report registers variance between the published defence budget and actual spending [1, 2, 3, 4]. Explanatory notes on the…
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