Council pays for Comair suspension

The High Court in Pretoria earlier this month slammed the Air Services Licensing Council with punitive cost orders after setting aside an earlier decision to suspend Comair’s domestic licence to fly.

In May 2016, Comair obtained an interdict that allowed it to continue flying until a court review of the council’s decision was finalised. The review application was heard in March this year and the recent ruling set the council’s decision aside.

Comair and the council have been at loggerheads since 2014, when FlySafair laid a complaint against Comair. FlySafair argued that Comair offended legislation because foreign shareholders’ voting rights exceeded 25% “on a look-through basis”.

This related to Bidvest’s 100% shareholding in BB Investments, which had a stake in Comair. Bidvest had a 47.9% foreign shareholding at the time.

FlySafair later capitulated. In July 2015, without engaging with it, the council notified Comair that it was noncompliant and set a 120-day deadline for it to comply.

Comair asked for the remainder of the 120-day period to be suspended for it to understand why council considered it noncompliant and what to take to satisfy council.

The court found: “Apparently, the council did not engage with Comair’s submission or indicate in which respect they were considered wrong, inaccurate or deficient.”

The court found that Comair, in May 2014, already supplied a full response to the FlySafair complaints and showed only 16.79% of voting rights were held by nonresident entities.

In November 2014, it supplied further information on council’s request, including independent experts’ reports on Comair’s certified and uncertified shareholder.