The joint venture between Paragon Investment Holdings and Ethiopian Airlines will take over ground handling services at the Hosea Kutako International Airport.
This was after the court declared that the contract between Menzies Aviation and the Namibia Airports Company shall come to an end today.
Yesterday, High Court judge Orben Sibeya, ordered Menzies, a United Kingdom-headquartered company to cease all services at HKIA, vacate occupation of any premises at the airport, and hand over all security access cards or other access equipment entitling it to access to HKIA or any premises it occupied during its operations.
“If the first respondent (Menzies) refuses to give effect to the order, then the deputy sheriff of this court is directed to evict the first respondent from HKIA and from all premises at HKIA occupied by the first respondent by virtue of the ground handling services agreement and remove all equipment belonging to the first respondent from the HKIA,” said Sibeya.
Sibeya also ordered Menzies to pay the cost of the suit.
NAC approached the court to declare that the contract between it and Menzies shall lapse today. This follows Menzies indicating they will not hand over the reins to the joint venture which won the tender to replace it because HKIA would allegedly be in grave danger should the joint venture take over the operations, as they are not ready to do so.
Menzies has been providing passenger and cargo handling services at HKIA since February 2014. Its contract has been extended twice before.
The joint venture is expected to start providing its services on 1 July.
Menzies, in their counter application, which was dismissed by the court, sought to have the court declare the contract between the joint venture and NAC set aside and declared null and void.
Furthermore, for the court to interdict NAC from evicting it from HKIA pending the outcome of the review application.
In the review application, Menzies is seeking a review of NAC’s decision to award the multi-million-dollar contract to the joint venture between Paragon and Ethiopian Airlines.
Menzies also claim they were discriminated against on the basis that they are not Namibian, despite 51% of its shares being owned by locals.
Furthermore, they said, NAC awarded the tender to a joint venture that did not meet bidding requirements, and it violated the law by awarding a tender exceeding N$25 million.
This, they say, is against the stipulated threshold, suggesting the Central Procurement Board of Namibia should have handled the bidding process.
The review application will be in court on 19 July before judge Eileen Rakow.
-mamakali@nepc.com.na