BANGKOK, March 18 (TNA) – Airports of Thailand PCL has suspended its sales of documents for a bidding contest for duty-free shops at four main airports pending its clarifications to all doubts.
AOT president Nitinai Sirismatthakarn said the sales were postponed from tomorrow as some parties suspected monopoly in AOT’s plan to have a single concessionaire for duty-free shops at Suvarnabhumi, Hat Yai, Chiang Mai and Phuket airports and the Transport Ministry asked if the project had to meet requirements under the public-private partnership law.
However, the AOT president expected a new concessionaire would be selected within this September so that the contractor would have a year for preparation. The current concession of King Power Group will expire in September next year.
“AOT is confident of its project implementation. Duty-free shops at the four airports must be run by a single and strong operator to ensure the positive image of the nation and efficient management,” Mr Nitinai said.
He said AOT could answer all doubts about the project within 1-2 weeks and the process of the bidding contest would then resume.
