[ad_1]
The Administrative Court of Cundinamarca admitted a lawsuit and took a precautionary measure against the Presidency of the Republic, the Ministry of Finance and Avianca Holdings SA
(Avianca pays a rate of more than 10% for a loan of US $ 1.3 billion).
On the demand, citizen Jonatan Ruíz Tobón assured that the Government and Avianca incurred in a violation of administrative morality, public patrimony and social security, due to the approval of a loan to the airline for 370 million dollars.
That loan, in any case, has not yet been disbursed since it must be approved by the New York Court where Avianca filed for Chapter 11 of the Bankruptcy Code.
The plaintiff He asked the Court to order the Government to refrain from allocating the resources of the Emergency Mitigation Fund (FOME) for the Avianca loan, but also requested that precautionary measures be taken to prevent the rights that he indicated from being violated..
Thus, although the Court has not yet accepted the claim in substance, it did accept the precautionary measure requested.
In consecuense, The Court ordered the Ministry of Finance to carry out “the necessary administrative steps so that the Emergency Mitigation Fund refrains from making the disbursement of the approved loan to Avianca.”
Among the arguments of the Court, it is read that the magistrates found that the demand is reasonable and that there is little public information on how that loan was processed and ordered. He also said that with the documents, information, arguments and justifications presented by the plaintiff, it can be concluded that “it would be more burdensome for the public interest to deny the precautionary measure than to grant it.”
According to the Court, the plaintiff reported on the financial situation facing Avianca, which shows that as of June 30, 2020, the group had losses of $ 353 million and an equity deficit of $ 355 million. The plaintiff also said that this bad economic situation is “pre-existing to the situation of the pandemic generated by the covid-19, because last year it did not report dividends among its shareholders due to the difficulties due to the financial situation that it has faced since then.”
Due to this situation, the plaintiff requested that public assets be protected by lending money to a company that, despite its importance for the Colombian economy, is in a financial situation like the one he described.
With all this, The Court considered that there is no clarity on the conditions under which the loan was granted or the guarantees that back this loan. In addition, he said, if the precautionary measures are not granted, it could generate “irreparable damage to public assets.”
And for the substantive analysis, the Court asked the Ministry to report the objective analysis it did to approve the loan.
Although the plaintiff requested that ordered President Iván Duque to report any possible conflict of interest due to the fact that his sister María Paula Duque Samper is Avianca’s Senior Vice President of Strategic Relations and Customer Experience, the Court denied that request. According to the corporation, this request is not related to the emergency precautionary measure so that the loan is not disbursed.
Justice
