Samuel Shinedima
THE High Court of Namibia will rule on whether Menzies Aviation will be reinstated as the ground handling services provider at Hosea Kutako International Airport on September 1st, 2023.
This comes after Menzies filed an urgent application seeking a spoliation order. The application follows Menzies’ eviction from Hosea Kutako International Airport over the weekend by the Namibian Airport Company (NAC). Menzies had been operating as a ground handling services provider at the airport since 2014 until it lost the tender contract to Paragon Investment in 2022.
The tender awarded to Paragon ignited the legal battle, with Menzies claiming that the awarding of the tender to Paragon was unlawful and that Paragon lacks the capacity to provide the required services to all airport stakeholders.
The Menzies legal team, led by Senior Counsel Raymond Heathcote, argued that Paragon is an illegal foreign entity without the capacity to provide the required services. He argued that the eviction of Menzies from the airport on Saturday morning was illegal because the deputy sheriff, along with the police, who collaborated to prevent Menzies’ employees from entering the premises, lacked a court-issued warrant of eviction.
“The strategy that they used is a common one used by the police, in that they waited until Friday evening to stop our employees from entering into the Airport premises because if they had done it earlier, they knew we were going to apply for an interdict. So, it is really strategy,” said Heathcote.
The legal representatives for NAC and Paragon Investment, Advocate Vincent Maleka and Sisa Namandje respectively, argued that there is nowhere in Namibian law where a court order, officially signed by the registrar of the High Court, needs a warrant of eviction to be given the effect of execution. They added that, if anything, a high court order holds a higher bar than a warrant issued by lower courts.
“My learned friend is saying that our client did not have a warrant of eviction in order to evict Menzies from the premises but the “warrant of eviction” spoken about by Menzies in paragraph 45 of the Founding Affidavit is, with respect, a Magistrates Court process as provided under Rule 36(1) of the Rules of the Magistrates Court. The point of the absence of a “warrant of eviction” must fail. Menzies is hopelessly confused on the difference between a warrant of ejectment in the Magistrates Court and the High Court,” Namandje argued.
The matter is postponed to September 1st, 2023, to determine whether or not a spoliation order will be granted. Such an order is typically granted to prevent individuals from taking the law into their own hands and to restore the rightful possession of those who have been wrongfully deprived of their possession.
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