The only real way in which to assess whether the arms deal offset projects are bringing benefits to our country is to look at those projects already in existence to see whether indeed they are profitable and creating jobs.

There should be no hesitation on government's part to allow the media to do this, particularly in light of mounting allegations of bribery, corruption and non-transparency in the massive procurement programme. Also, if the offset policy is as beneficial as government claims it is, then why not shout the success of these projects from the mountain tops? Instead, the trade and industry department and at least one defence equipment supplier are keeping a tight lid on offset projects which are claimed to have been in existence for two years.

The German submarine Consortium has declined to furnish Business Day with the most elementary information about, or a telephone number of, the only three non-defence projects that the consortium is understood to have established so far. One of the projects, an agriculture and floriculture project, is said to have created 1 600 jobs in the Eastern and Western Cape.

This information was contained in a government report last month on national industrial participation projects, which has already proved inaccurate - one of the German Submarine Consortium's projects listed in the report, a cold rolling mill in the Eastern Cape, has in fact been scrapped.

Given the secrecy and inaccuracy, is government to be believed when it claims - as it does in the offset report - that 45 projects have been implemented and that these should generate exports and investment worth more than $6bn?

It also leads to a far more important question: is government abreast of the developments at each offset project, or are they blindly believing their lucky partners, the defence equipment suppliers, when compiling these figures?

When the trade and industry department was asked about the apparently secret floriculture and agriculture project, it felt it necessary to consult with the German submarine Consortium before responding.

Still more discomforting is the response that it could not comment, because this "is a commercial project". Give us a break!

The department should have lambasted the submarine consortium for snubbing the local media and its readers. Instead, government is telling the public they don't have the right to know, and defence suppliers they don't have to tell.

With acknowledgements to the Editor and the Business Day.