Transport Minister Joe Mizzi yesterday denied the private company that bought the bendy buses has violated the conditions set in its expression of interest.
Instead, he insisted the deal was still valid according to legal advice given by Malta Public Transport Ltd’s lawyer, the former Nationalist MP George Hyzler.
“It is not true that the contract has been violated and we have acted on the advice given by George Hyzler,” he insisted.
“The bid we chose was by far the most advantageous and our lawyer told us we can still strike a deal with the private company,” the minister said.
Asked to justify why the new owners were given a €200,000 discount on their original bid if they chose to scrap the buses instead of exporting them, Mr Mizzi refused to explain but said this was done on Dr Hyzler’s legal advice.
Contacted by this newspaper, Dr Hyzler confirmed he had given this advice but would say no more due to professional secrecy.
Earlier this week, Times of Malta reported various transport companies that had submitted bids, or were in the process of submitting their interest, were furious when they learnt the original expression of interest conditions were “thrown out of the window”.
The conditions, seen by this newspaper, stated the buses had to leave Malta within four weeks from the signing of the award.
Bidders were also asked to write where they would ship the buses on presentation of their bid.
However, although originally the Transport Ministry had announced that the buses were sold to Trihills Heavy Industry – a local company – for €601,000 and were to be shipped to Sudan, things changed drastically when the deal between the new owners and the Sudanese fell through.
Following a series of questions by PN spokesman Toni Bezzina, Mr Mizzi admitted in Parliament that the buses are no longer to be exported and will be sold as scrap.
He also revealed that instead of the original payment, Trihills were given a concession to pay only €460,000 if they did not export the buses and scrapped them.
Sources close to Transport Malta told this newspaper that since one of the main conditions of the expression of interest has been violated, the contract should no longer be valid and the government should re-issue the bid.
But Mr Mizzi yesterday said the government had no intention of doing so. Times of Malta is informed that some of bidders are considering taking the government to court over this issue.
Meanwhile, Malta Public Transport yesterday announced the arrival of 11 new buses, which will form part of a group of 45 leased buses through a direct order from the UK to improve the service over the summer.
The buses have been hired by the government company on the eve of the closing of a tender for the concession of public transport and will cost the company some €2.4 million.
However, these vehicles have only been leased for a year.
Since Malta Public Transport took over the running of the public transport service from Arriva, it has recorded loses of some €2.7 million a month.