Basil strong wording is certainly not appropriate but not that far from a fragment of truth, if I may put it that way...
What's really amazing: since this thread started, I couldn't read here the names of the true bad guys: former CEO Bruggisser and former Head of Finances Schorderet.
One should figure out how far their criminal energy reached as they used illegal means - including corruption - :
A/ to take the control over foreign companies and their top managers in spite of EU-Rules limiting a non-EU Swiss participation to 49% at least in four european countries: Belgium (SN); France (AOM, Air Liberte, Air Littoral), Portugal (TAP) and Germany (LTU);
B/ to conceal the huge losses of the SAirGroup up the end. When Schorderet was fired (Mid 2001), almost no one but him (and some bankers) knew how big the disaster was.
If Corti had known, he wouldn't have ever taken the bid to restructure the company, even not for 21 Mio Swiss Francs! In turn, he lied too, about a one billion Swiss francs revolving facility (April 2001) and did some cosmetic instead of selling asap what could really bring some cash in. Ironically, Corti said so, at a time he hadn't yet checked what the bank analysts already knew: even if this 1 Bn credit line had really been secured, it would never have been enough to achieve a turn-around
So, what do we have? A bunch of criminals, on one hand, big dummies on the other, and somewhere in between a huge crowd of people, who just couldn't believe what was happening to them.
PS: I forgot to mention LOT but Poland was still a long way from belonging to the EU.