Imperial fights with state over interest on R90m car hire bill left by Scorpions
July 24, 2009
By Roy Cokayne
The disbanded Scorpions have left the government with a R90 million car hire bill that has accrued interest since 2005 and Imperial Holdings is now grappling with the state over the account in court.
Interest accrued in the claim stood at R11.35m in September 2005 and has risen steadily with the prime rate, which rose as high as 15 percent in December and is now at 11 percent.
The matter was postponed indefinitely by mutual consent in April 2006.
Jeetesh Ravjee of TWB Attorneys & Partners, Imperial's attorneys, confirmed yesterday the amount claimed by Imperial had, since September 2005, been attracting interest at the prime rate.
Imperial previously applied to the Johannesburg High Court for summary judgment against the state because of its failure to pay the amount owing.
Ravjee said the government submitted a counterclaim for R21.98m.
The amount allegedly owed by the National Prosecuting Authority (NPA) resulted from cars provided to the Scorpions as an addendum to the multibillion-rand six-year deal signed in 1999 that made Imperial's fleet management unit the exclusive supplier of cars to five state units.
A referee was agreed on by the parties in November 2007 to speed up resolution.
Ravjee said that after receiving submissions by the parties, the referee assisted in identifying and narrowing the issues.
Parties were engaged in the preparation of a detailed reconciliation of their respective contentions to try and quantify the items in dispute as proposed by the referee.
Ravjee said a court date had not been set and consideration would only be given to taking the matter back to court if the dispute could not be resolved with the help of the referee.
But Bulelwa Makeke, the NPA's executive manager of communication, said the matter was handed to the state attorney on behalf of the authority.
"We can confirm that it is receiving attention and in all likelihood will be brought before court soon. We therefore do not think it is appropriate to respond to details on the matter to the media at the moment."
In an affidavit filed for the court case, Marion Sparg, then the chief executive of the NPA, said that during 2003 both the NPA and Transport Department, the custodian of the total contract, independently became aware there were serious problems with the contract implementation and management.
Independent consultants were appointed to investigate, which revealed shortcomings.
Sparg said Imperial was given full particulars of all transactions, shortcomings, and the nature and extent of the NPA's queries to enable it to address and resolve them.
She said Imperial was assured the outstanding amount would be paid once documents were furnished and queries resolved, but Imperial had not satisfactorily complied with this.
Imperial said that throughout the contract period it rendered full accounting to the state as required by the contract.
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