BCL houses may be sold
Onalenna Kelebeile | Friday June 23, 2017 15:20
While other former employees opted to vacate and relocate to their respective home villages majority are still occupying the house. Those occupying the houses are now paying for their utility bills from their pockets.
The provisional liquidator, Nigel Dixon-Warren explained during an interview that the decision to allow former employees to occupy the houses for 12 months was necessary because that time they expected to have a clear picture as to what will happen to BCL.
“The picture is unclear still-but now that we are in final liquidation, the housing forms part of the assets that I will sell in due course. If the housing is bought by a party that intends to restart operations at BCL then they will utilise the housing for their staff,” he said.
He added that government had informed him that staff has requested that the period be extended to November 30, 2017 to enable children to complete the school year. “These requests have not been made to me yet but if they are I will accede to it as in my view it is not likely that we will have disposed off the assets then,” he added. Meanwhile he highlighted in the previous interview that creditors might not receive anything if Mines’ assets are not sold.
The company allegedly owes about P1 billion to its close to 700 creditors. Dixon-Warren has said during an interview that creditors will have to wait to see whether a buyer can be secured to restart some or all of the BCL operations.
“If so there may be a dividend to creditors but it is not known what this might be. If we are unable to sell the operations then we will have to sell piecemeal. Ultimately if we cannot sell many assets and BCL has to close fully then creditors will not find anything,” he said.
Dixon-Warren however said he does not have information at hand as to how much BCL owes its creditors. He explained that final liquidation means that the formal liquidation process can now commence and added that the first legal requirement is for the first meeting of creditors to be held at the High Court. “I will be meeting with the Master of the High Court shortly to agree on the date which is likely to be three months from now. The first meeting of creditors provides the opportunity for creditors to submit their claims and for the final liquidator to be appointed,” he said.
He also noted that care and maintenance is likely to continue at least until the first meeting of creditors so that they can see if a buyer can be secured. “If there is no real possibilities of selling then we will start to cut back on care and maintenance for those assets that cannot be sold and continue for those that can,” he said.
He added that the process of finding potential buyers is starting now and stated that he has been contacted by a number of interested buyers. “Whether they will actually buy will only be known in the future,” he said.