ZAZ wins lawsuit of Poland seeking to collect over $70 mln for not meeting FSO commitments
The Warsaw court (Poland) on October 3, 2018 declared groundless the lawsuit of the State Treasury of Poland against Zaporizhia Automobile Plant (ZAZ) seeking to collect some PLN 250 million (over $70 million) for not meeting commitments taken during the purpose of a state-owned stake in Poland's FSO automobile plant in 2005.
"Thus, the arguments of the State Treasury of Poland, which requested this amount to pay for contractual fines, were rejected by the court completely, and the claims were found to be groundless and unfounded," the press release of the UkrAVTO Corporation, which includes ZAZ, reported.
According to the report, the Warsaw court found unreasonable the claim of the State Treasury against ZAZ about alleged non-fulfillment of additional contingent liabilities by ZAZ not included in the investment plan, but stipulated in the privatization agreement of 2005 for buying 19.9% of FSO shares for PLN 100 (which gave 84.31% of the votes at the general meeting), the real value of which at that time was estimated by independent experts from the Big Four at more than minus PLN 1.2 billion.
"We welcome this positive decision of the Warsaw Court. Given some of the "differences" between our judicial system and the Polish one, we were convinced that making a fair decision in favor of a foreign investor is absolutely normal, even if the claimant is the state. This is nothing but a high legal culture of the society in which the rule of law is in effect," the press service of the UkrAVTO Corporation said, citing Head of the property relations department of Ihor Seniuta.
As reported, in November 2017, the Rzeczpospolita newspaper, referring to Press Secretary of the Polish Prosecutor General's Office Sylwia Hajnrych, said that Poland demands about PLN 250 million from Ukraine's PJSC Zaporizhia Automobile Plant for a failure to fulfill the obligations undertaken with the purchase of a state stake in the Polish automotive plant FSO (Warsaw) in 2005.
The press service of UkrAVTO then told Interfax-Ukraine that ZAZ fulfilled all commitments taken to the Polish government regarding FSO outlined in the privatization agreement. This was confirmed by the State Treasury to ZAZ sent in 2011 and by Deloitte & Touche.