Court against JSC Azersu Postponed

Scheduled for 9 December, the court hearing on the lawsuit of the news agency Turan against the state water distribution company JSC Azersu has been postponed.

The assistant referee of Baku Administrative-Economic Court №1 Arafat Mammadova informed the agency that the trial was postponed until 21 December due to the fact that the judge Mammadova is to take part in a seminar organized by the Ministry of Justice on December 9.

Thus, obtaining a response to the August 30 request for information has been delayed again.

At the last meeting on November 28, the court considered the claim of the agency in connection with the lack of response on the part of Azersu to the request for information about the fate of the execution of the Azerbaijan President’s order on March 29, 2016 "On ensuring people with metering devices." According to the order for purchase and installation of meters, 12 million manat was allocated.

The representative of Azersu at the trial said that only the day before he received the statement of claim and was not familiar with the case. He asked for time to study Turan’s request. Turan’s Director Mehman Aliyev asked the agency to provide a response, which can be prepared for only a couple of hours until the next meeting, that is, until 9 December. But so far, the answer has not been submitted. "This indicates that Azersu is not ready to answer the questions, and we are also not satisfied with the decision to postpone the trial until 21 December,” said Aliyev.

At the trial on November 28 Aliyev urged the judge to give a legal assessment to the fact of failure to submit information and to apply Articles 374, 382 of the Code on Administrative Violations with a fine collection of maximum 1,500 manat from Azersu for failure to provide a response. "There is a good reason for this," said Aliyev, noting that the laws "On Mass Media", "On Freedom of Information" and "On Combating Corruption" (v. 9.3.12) were grossly violated. However, the judge Mammadova noted that any offense had not been defined (?!), and the court cannot make any decision.

In 2006, on behalf of President Ilham Aliyev, Azersu declared a state program for the installation of water meters by the end of 2008. Later the head of state asked to complete the process in 2007. After 10 years, the program is completed only at 60%, which does not let draw the right conclusions about the volume of water consumed in the country and for this purpose the costs are financed by the customers, the state and foreign loans. -01C--