Groundforce’s creditors are voting today on the handling company’s insolvency plan, which provides for its recovery and the entry of new shareholder Menzies Aviation, after several months of negotiations.
The creditors’ meeting of SPDH – Serviços Portugueses de Handling (Groundforce Portugal) is scheduled to begin at 13:30 in the Commercial Court of the Lisbon District Court.
Drawn up by insolvency administrators Bruno Costa Pereira and Pedro Piwell, the recovery plan provides for the capital of the airport ground handling company to be reduced to zero and for it to be capitalized by a new shareholder: Britain’s Menzies, owned by Kuwait’s Agility, which will hold 50.1% of the capital, with the remainder going to TAP, through the conversion of credits.
According to the Aviation and Airports Workers’ Union (Sitava), it is already guaranteed that the plan will be approved, “since the favorable votes of the two largest creditors (ANA and TAP) are enough”.
It is also expected that a large part of the workers will vote in favor, since the two main representative unions (Sitava and the Handling and Airport Technicians Union – STHA) have signed an agreement in principle with Menzies.
However, he adds, “it is also to be expected (given all the disinformation and manipulation that has been going on, especially in the last two months) that it will not be approved unanimously, which would allow it to be ratified immediately”.
In a statement released last week, Sitava assured that the final version of Groundforce’s insolvency plan clarifies that the planned departure of 300 workers will only be carried out through amicable terminations, eliminating the expression “preferably by mutual agreement” that appeared in the preliminary version.
The insolvency administrators, on the other hand, guarantee that the recovery plan “does not harm any of the workers’ rights, ensuring that their actual claims will be settled expeditiously (no later than 60 days after the final judgment approving the plan) and without recourse to the moratoriums to which the company’s other creditors will be subject if the plan is approved.”
TAP filed for Groundforce’s insolvency in 2021, in a process whose provisional list of creditors at the time pointed to around 154 million euros in debts. Subsequently, according to the plan, the recognized debts were set at 136.2 million euros.
The biggest creditors are TAP and ANA – Aeroportos de Portugal, with 15.5 million euros and 12.8 million euros respectively.
Menzies plans an initial investment of 12.5 million euros in Groundforce.
