Mess-up over presidential planes expected to cost taxpayer R200m

A BUNGLE by Department of Defence head honchos in leasing planes for the president and his deputy is set to cost taxpayers more than R200-million.

Seven years ago‚ the department went shopping for two aircraft for “very‚ very important persons” – then president Jacob Zuma and his deputy, Kgalema Motlanthe.

But the secretary for defence‚ Sam Gulube‚ and his predecessor‚ Mpumi Mpofu‚ failed to sign the five-year lease agreement‚ worth nearly R827-million‚ with successful bidder Adonai Aviation.

This was despite having given the company an acceptance letter.

Instead‚ the department started scouting around for the acquisition or lease of other aircraft.

Now the Pretoria High Court has ruled that Defence Minister Nosiviwe Mapisa-Nqakula must pay the company more than R200-million in damages and slapped her with a punitive costs order.

In his judgment‚ Judge Norman Davis said he was appalled by the department’s conduct.

Mpofu and former air force chief Lieutenant-General Carlo Gagiano resigned in 2011 amid claims that mercenary pilots had been hired to fly VIPs.

The department was left redfaced in the same year when Motlanthe had to board a commercial flight to Scandinavia after a chartered aircraft was grounded by technical problems.

Lindiwe Sisulu‚ then minister of defence‚ was reportedly enraged when she discovered Zuma had been flown to New York by pilots who had been jailed for taking part in a failed 2004 coup attempt in Equatorial Guinea.

Technical problems that grounded the presidential aircraft‚ Inkwazi‚ were also a headache for the department.

Davis said Adonai had scored highest in evaluation of eight tenders and received an acceptance letter‚ but the department had refused to sign the detailed agreement subsequently negotiated. “Sometime hereafter it became known that the [department] was scouting around for the acquisition or lease of other aircraft‚” Davis said.

“Fearing the issuing of a new tender or the initiation of a new bid process‚ [Adonai] launched an urgent application against . . . [the minister].

“The recalcitrant refusal to sign the agreements in the circumstances of this case amount to a deliberate thwarting of the suspensive conditions to the effect that they should be deemed to have been fulfilled.”

The department argued that the lease with Adonai had never come into existence because the company had failed to provide aircraft for it to inspect for acceptability.

The department accused Adonai of misrepresentation by claiming it owned aircraft.

“The [company] knew that the representation was false in that it was not the owner or in control of the aircraft at all relevant times hereto‚” Mapisa-Nqakula said in court papers.

“As a consequence of the [company’s] lack of ownership and control‚ the jurisdictional facts necessary for the fulfilment of the conditions could not be met.”

But the company said it had paid a $2.5-million (R32-million) deposit for the aircraft about three months after its bid was accepted.

It said the department had taken every step possible to avoid the consequences of having awarded the bid to it.

Davis said Gulube‚ appointed shortly after Mpofu’s resignation in November 2011‚ claimed the agreement contained “unsettling features” but failed to list them in his affidavit.

“This general non-responsiveness is in similar vein to the lack of answers to the numerous letters from [Adonai] and its lawyers‚” he said.

Adonai Aviation’s lawyer, Leslie Cohen‚ declined to comment.

Mapisa-Nqakula’s spokesman‚ Siphiwe Dlamini‚ said: “We are studying the judgment and there is no decision yet on what our next move is.”

‘ [The department] was scouting around for the lease of other aircraft