8 years after, court quashes PAHCOL, AHS ground handling pact
A Federal High Court sitting in Abuja has quashed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) between Aviation Services International Ltd (AHS) and its Nigerian partner, Precision Aviation Handling Company of Nigeria (PAHCOL), over the abandonment of the contract.
The court also ruled that the defendants contradicted the laws of the Federal Republic of Nigeria and the Civil Aviation Act 2006, particularly Section 72 of the ground handling license.
The plaintiffs in the case were Precision Support Services Ltd, Merit Oil Ltd and Precision Aviation Handling Company Ltd, while the defendants were
Aviation Handling Services International Ltd, BVI and Menzies Aviation (Africa) Ltd.
Daily Trust reports that PAHCOL and its partner, AHS, in 2018 suspended ground handling work at the Lagos and Abuja airports to allow them to regularise documentation with the Nigerian Civil Aviation Authority (NCAA).
The NCAA at the time accused the firms of operating unapproved ground handling services which eventually became an issue of litigation.
But in a 49-page judgment delivered on May 3, 2023, in Abuja by Justice Obiora Atuegwu Egwuatu in suit FHC/ABJ/ CS/566/2021 obtained by our correspondent, the court declared that the MoU signed on June 22, 2016, between the 3rd plaintiff (PAHCOL) and the 1st defendant (AHC), which was the preliminary understanding of the parties to a proposed joint venture was in gross violation of the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria 1999 and the Civil Act 2006.
The court declared that the contravention of Nigerian laws and the Civil Aviation Act made the contract unenforceable and should be disregarded.
The court also ruled that the MoU signed in respect of aviation ground handling services in Nigeria had expired by “effluxion of time on June 30, 2017.”
The court also stated that since the plaintiffs and defendant did not sign the Joint Venture Agreement (JVA) as contemplated, the proposed agreement was therefore inchoate and liable to be terminated.