Avia Invest began denying the rent to MGH Ground Handling by stating that the rooms in question needed to be repaired. “I assure you that those facilities did not need any repairs,” the manager specified. 
 

As a result of Avia Invest’s measures to capture the ground services market at the Chisinau International Airport, the market share of MGH Ground Handling dropped from 35% down to 5% and Aeroport Handling’s share has increased up to 95%. For this reason, Anatolie Bzovîi believes that the fine imposed by the Competition Council is “too mild.” The council should extend its investigation over all of the irregularities which we tabled before it and the fines should be bigger, maybe ten times as bigger as the 5-million-leu penalty, Mr. Bzovîi thinks. If these measures are neglected then Avia Invest will succeed in taking over all services at the main Moldovan air gate. “Implicitly, this means lower quality and higher prices,” he warned. 
 

Neither does the state-owned company Aeroport Catering do well under the new managers. If in 2012 it published a profit of 1.4 million lei and a turnover of 44.75 million lei, already in 2013 – the year when the airport was conceded to Avia Invest – the figures company reported 3.7 million lei in losses and a turnover of 26.4 million lei. Next year, it posted 524,000 lei in profit and 29.2 million lei in turnover, given the increase of the number of passengers from 1.22 million in 20112 up to 1.78 million in 2014.

Sources in the company say Aeroport Catering was plunging down because Avia Invest preferred service providers which are affiliated to itself. Aeroport Catering director briefly denied these allegations but refused to elaborate on this topic. 
 

Aeroport Handling is a limited liability firm (SRL) that is owned by Air Handling SRL. In turn, Air Handling belongs to a foreign company called Air Klassica SRL. Then Air Klassika is a daughter company of Wester Alliance LLP, which is registered in the United Kingdom and went out of business in November 2014. Until recently, Air Klassika was held by Nobil Air, which was founded in 2003 by Vera Morozan, a sister of Moldovan oligarch Vladimir Plahotniuc. 
 

The Kroll report regarding the one-billion-USdollar fraud in the Moldovan bank system says that Air Klassica borrowed 40.4 million lei from Unibank in 2014. Air Klassica owner Ilan Shor admitted before journalists during a police probe on the fraud that the companies Durfremol, Air Klassica, Nobil Air, and their partner companies belonged to him, but he assured that they had paid off their loans. 
 

Worth to mention is that the way Aeroport Handling fell into possession of Air Klassica raises serious question marks. A prospering state-owned enterprise, it was privatized by Valan Internațional Cargo Charter in April 2014 for 27.6 million lei. Two months later Valan International Cargo Charter sells this asset for 27.9 million lei. The deal was made in the form of supplement to the statutory capital. 

Sources told Mold-Street that Aeroport Handling was conceded as a result of the same pressures which MGH Ground Handling had experienced. Immediately after acquisition, Valan International Cargo Charter, which deals with air cargo, became a target of Avia Invest’s pressures. It received notices about its contracts being cancelled. In order to keep safe its main business, Valan International Cargo Charter abandoned Aeroport Handling.
 

The attention of the Competition Council regarding Avia Invest does not end with the recently ordered fine. Another complaint is waiting examination regarding the charges of creation of monopoly in the airport services market. The Competition Council declined to comment on the case by saying that the probe has just kicked off. 
 

Mold-Street has repeatedly called Avia Invest director Petru Jardan to record the other part of the story but he never answered or replied. Company representatives said they would not comment on the subject. 

 

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