ANGRY INVESTORS CANCEL KMIII AIRPORT’S E91.7 BILLION INVESTMENT

MBABANE – Potential investors who wanted to develop King Mswati III International Airport into the largest cargo hub in Africa have cancelled the investment out of anger.

Douglas Berry, the Founder and Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of a company styled Crowne Aeroplace said the decision came as a direct and exclusive result of what he described as ‘disgusting actions’ of the Director General (DG) of Eswatini Civil Aviation Authority (ESWACAA) Andile Mtetwa on January 26, 2022. Berry made the allegations in a letter addressed to the Prime Minister (PM) Cleopas Sipho Dlamini, dated January 31, 2022. However, Mtetwa has refuted Berry’s allegations; pointing out that she was being made a scapegoat as she, in the first place, was not aware of the meeting and its agenda, but attended it with interest and dedication.

She said cameras were installed in the boardroom where the meeting was held, and she could prove that Berry was economical with the truth as she briefly stepped out of the meeting to attend to her stranded school-going daughter. She said her daughter called her to report that she had no transport to take her home, and as a parent, she asked to be excused for a moment to attend to the frustrated child. Principal Secretary (PS) in the Ministry of Public Works and Transport Thulani Mkhaliphi who chaired the meeting said he found the reason for Mtetwa’s stepping out of the meeting to be genuine and acceptable. Mkhaliphi said the meeting shifted from discussing the presentation to arguing over the DG’s stepping out of the boardroom. He explained that the DG’s presence was administrative as the technical experts representing ESWACAA and the ministry were present and paying attention to the sophisticated issues.  

Giving background of the debacle, Berry, the Crowne Aerospace CEO, alleged that a delegation from his company consisting of himself, Adrian Hollenbach, the Chief Operating Officer (COO) and Lord Shaun Vanderpool, a majority shareholder and investor, travelled from Johannesburg to meet the Minister of Public Works and Transport, Chief Ndlaluhlaza Ndwandwe at his offices. This was on January 26, 2022. He said they then proceeded to the offices of ESWACAA on the same day for a meeting scheduled for 2pm with the DG in order to bring the Authority up to speed on planning changes and to seek input from them as per their requirements. Berry explained to the pm that the receptionist ushered them into the boardroom where they were seated. He alleged that the DG entered the boardroom and asked who they were and why they were there.

He said the attitude took him aback immediately, and he offered to leave and abandon the meeting. “Her response was, ‘no, I’m here now so I may as well hear what this is about’. This on its own was highly unprofessional and borderline insulting,” further alleged Berry in the letter addressed to the prime minister. As a result of this attitude, he said the directors and shareholders of the company took the decision to no longer invest in the Kingdom of Eswatini. He disclosed that the cargo airline direct foreign investment totalled to E91.7 billion, the equivalent of US$6.2 billion according to yesterday’s foreign exchange rate.

“We hereby bring to your attention the decision taken by the Board of Directors as well as the majority shareholder in the holding company to no longer continue with our plans to invest in the kingdom and to develop King Mswati III International Airport into the largest cargo hub on the continent of Africa. We have instead commenced with negotiations with other countries to host this lucrative and prestigious project,” he stated in the letter.  “This decision comes as a direct and exclusive result of the disgusting actions of the Director General of ESWACAA on Wednesday 26, January.”

He said while they waited for the PS from the minister’s office to arrive, so that they could commence with a detailed presentation on the project. Berry added that the detailed presentation included the company structure, route network; fleet composition, architectural plans for the development of the western side of KMIII International Airport, the administrative offices, and crew accommodation. To my absolute surprise, he said the DG walked out of the meeting without making any attempt to communicate with them, five minutes after the presentation began and only to return after it was completed. “Once again without any explanation, I told her that I and the team felt insulted by her actions and that we considered them to be rude, impertinent and disgusting,” he said.

He said it was their considered opinion that arrogance played a major role in her attitude towards us. “Only then did she respond by telling us that, ‘we had to understand that her seven-year-old daughter was stranded outside of her school with no way to get home, and I am a single mother with two kids’,” alleged Berry. “This was a contrived and pathetic attempt to divert the attention away from the preceding actions.” He also informed the prime minister that the DG entered the meeting and did not proffer her calling cards to the delegation. He described this act as lack of professionalism on her behalf and certainly contravened accepted and expected business etiquette.  “It was only after the DG asked us to send her a list of requirements and I told her that we had no idea who she was or how to communicate with her as she went to collect calling cards,” he told the prime minister.

The potential investor said the reality of the situation was that the kingdom had effectively lost E91.7 billion (US$ 6.2 billion) in investment. He said the kingdom has also lost the following –
The creation of 630 permanent job opportunities;
The creation of approximately 2 000 temporary jobs during construction;
Increase in the utilisation of KMIII International Airport;
Commitment to skill transfer and training, pilot training, internship programmes;
Commitment to school programmes in the rural areas, and several other business opportunities which Lord Vanderpool intended to establish in the kingdom. Berry said there was no doubt in his mind whatsoever that this was a disaster for the economy particularly in the light of the current unrest and challenges being experienced in the kingdom. He said there was no doubt in his mind that this was bound to be repeated in future by the bureaucracy.

DG’s response

DG Mtetwa said it was a pity the director penned an emotional letter which had a lot of inconsistencies that did not make any sense to her. For starters, she denied that she said she was single and had two children. She said she has three children, and is a married woman. She is Mrs. Amaeshi. The DG said her superior was in attendance when she reasonably and respectfully stepped out of the meeting to attend to a pressing personal matter that distracted her attention. In her recollections, she said the investors became uncomfortable when the principal secretary said there was to be a need for government, as usual, to do due diligence. In this context, due diligence means conducting comprehensive appraisal of a business to be undertaken by the prospective investor to establish its assets and liabilities and to further evaluate its commercial potential.

Asked why they wanted to do due digilence, Mtetwa said it was essential because the company claimed to have been registered in the United Kingdom (UK) and later Bermuda.
She said it was neat to check how it operated in the UK and Bermuda. She added that the capital they talked about was a massive amount of money that could have required expertise in the civil aviation to assist the country and the company itself put facts together to form an impression. She said the investment part of the deal could not be handled by ESWACAA, as it was not its responsibility. She explained that she had assembled a technical team that followed the presentation with interest. This team, she said was going to advise her on what should be done to realise the investment.

Pertaining to the calling cards, she said she was used to taking them out at the end of the meeting. “I have to first know the persons I am talking to. At the end of the meeting, we can then exchange the business cards,” she said. She said she also didn’t know that they were coming.  The DG said she remained calm even when some of the members of the delegation would harshly direct one of them to remove a face mask because they did not hear him as it muffled the sound. She said there was a time when phrases such as ‘who do you think you are, were used. Even then, she said they remained calm, polite and professional.

Pressed further on revelations that the Director General (DG) of Eswatini Civil Aviation Authority (ESWACAA) Andile Mtetwa stepped out of the meeting and left behind her superior who happens to be the PS, Berry responded that there was nobody more senior to the DG at ESWACAA.  He said the PS was new to the post, and had no insight whatsoever into matters concerning civil aviation, its regulatory standards (CARS) or technical standards (CATS). Asked to respond to reports that it was not clear in Crowne Aerospace’s presentation what it wanted ESWACAA to do, he said what was required from the Authority would have been presented had the DG not left the room. He said had she been there she would have heard the reference to the need for Bilateral Air Service Agreements (BASA’s) to be concluded across the network. Berry pointed out that the issue was that the DG did not ask to be excused from the presentation before leaving the room, thereby, creating the impression that either she had no interest in what was being tabled or alternatively was opposed to what was being presented.

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