An attempt by a company to claim a 25% black economic empowerment (BEE) stake in the Gautrain project was dismissed with costs in the Johannesburg High Court on Wednesday.
”I take this as a personal victory for the project and for the country. This project is bigger than any individual,” said Mzolisi Diliza, chairperson of the board of directors of the Strategic Partners Group (SPG), a BEE company that was among the respondents in the matter.
In his judgement, Judge IW Schwartzman said that the director of both Loliwe companies — Loliwe Rail Contractors and Loliwe Rail Express — Mbuli Swana, had ”breached the duty of good faith” required of him as consultant to SPG by trying to seize its stake in the Bombela Consortium.
Schwartzman said Loliwe asserted that there had been an agreement in place in terms of which the two companies replaced SPG as the Bombela Consortium’s BEE component.
Bombela, which comprises construction firm Murray and Roberts, Bombardier and Bouygues, denied this.
The Loliwe companies had been unable to produce any written agreement supporting their assertion that they were members of the Bombela Consortium, Schwartzman said.
Loliwe asserted that, since August 31, they had been wrongfully excluded from participating in negotiations with the Gauteng provincial government.
Bombela had acted lawfully in having done so, Schwartzman said in his judgement.
During the course of his judgement, Schwartzman said newspaper reports that he had described the tender process as ”flawed and a charade” were not true.
”I accordingly distance myself from any suggestion made in newspaper reports … that I labelled the tender process as flawed and a charade,” he said.
The consortium was chosen as the preferred bidder for the Gautrain project on July 2.
Diliza said the court action will not affect the project.
”The litigation has never attempted to interfere with the project. There is no threat to the project at all.”
Construction on the Gautrain will start at the beginning of 2009, Gauteng’s department of finance and economic affairs said in a statement on Wednesday.
”The process to finalise the Gautrain Rapid Rail Link is on track. We are currently negotiating financial closure with the preferred bidder, Bombela. This process should be completed by the end of the year,” provincial minister Paul Mashatile said in a statement.
The link between Sandton and Johannesburg International airport will be operational in 2009 and the complete system in April 2010, in time for that year’s Soccer World Cup. — Sapa