Pretoria - The transaction adviser appointed by the City of Tshwane for the Wonderboom National Airport is assessing legal position after the court overturned the contract.
Tshwane is again managing the airport after the Gauteng High Court, Pretoria, interdicted the appointment of Ntiyiso Consulting.
Ntiyiso’s Mhlanganisi Madlongolwana told the Pretoria News that they would talk to their legal representatives about the order issued by the court.
“We are at this point in consultation with our legal representatives and the City of Tshwane to determine the most suitable way forward for all parties involved,” he said.
Madlongolwana said they felt the firm could definitely assist the City in making the cash-strapped airport financially viable again.
The court has overturned the appointment of the external contractor as an adviser regarding the management of the Wonderboom Airport.
It ordered that the decision by the City to appoint Ntiyiso Consulting as an external mechanism and a transaction adviser for the structuring of assets and implementation of an optimal revenue general plan for the airport be reviewed and set aside.
This followed an earlier application launched by the Wonderboom Airport Interest Group on behalf of various businesses within the facility, who voiced their concerns about the management of the facility.
The group last year managed to suspend the appointment of Ntiyiso Consulting.
This was pending review proceedings, in which the court has now overturned the appointment.
Madlongolwana said they had noted and accepted the decision by the court.
“As Ntiyiso Consulting, we accept the default judgment on this matter. We want to clarify that we were not appointed to run or manage the airport. This prevailing narrative is false and designed to create misinformation about our firm’s capabilities,” he said.
He said as experts in revenue and business consulting, they responded to a request for proposal through a long-established panel of the City, which was seeking to appoint a company that could improve the financial position of the airport.
“This is a field of work in which we have over a decade’s worth of experience.
“Our appointment was to restructure the airport’s assets, as well as implement a strategy that would ensure the optimal generation of revenue for the Wonderboom National Airport, to move it from a loss-making entity to generating a surplus.”
Madlongolwana said one of the key deliverables included ensuring the airport’s assets hotel, flight school, hangars, parking as well as its commercial property rentals, became profitable, such that the City did not continue to subsidise them.
“As an experienced consulting firm in revenue services, we prepared a bid for the contract which was found to be responsive to the requirement of the City and as such we were awarded the tender fairly.
“We would like to add that we assembled a team of experts ranging from transport economists, attorneys, pilots, property and financial specialists as part of the team to assist the City to restructure the assets. We are currently providing similar services to two other airports, with the added scope of commercialising these entities – a further testament of our experience in this field.”
Pretoria News