DOT TO HOLD HEARING ON DHL AIRWAYSÆ CITIZENSHIP STATUS
The U.S. Department of Transportation said late Thursday it would hold public hearings on whether DHL Airways was a legal U.S.-flag carrier under airline nationality requirements.
Congress directed the department to hold a formal proceeding on DHL's citizenship.
A DOT administrative law judge will conduct a hearing and submit his recommended decision to the department by Sept. 2. The secretary of transportation will issue a final decision.
The move is a procedural victory for U.S. package delivery companies FedEx Corp. and United Parcel Service Inc. in their running battle to beat back Deutsche Post World Net, the German logistics and postal giant, as it seeks to expand into the U.S. market.
UPS and FedEx asked Transportation Secretary Norman Mineta last August to conduct a formal enforcement investigation after Deutsche Post acquired a majority stake in Brussels, Belgium-based DHL International, a global overnight delivery company.
Lynden Air Cargo filed a similar petition, according to DOT. Mineta previously ruled after an informal review in 2001 that DHL met the requirements for U.S. citizenship.
DHL Airways is 25-percent owned by DHL Worldwide Express, a subsidiary of Bonn-based logistics and German postal giant Deutsche Post. Federal law requires that American interests must own at least 75 percent of a U.S. airline, and the president and two-thirds of the board be U.S. citizens.
The congressional directive to conduct its investigation in public and use an administrative law judge was included in a supplemental spending bill devoted to covering the expense of the war in Iraq and homeland security activities that President Bush signed on Wednesday.
In March, DOT Inspector General Kenneth Meade recommended to House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee Chairman Don Young, R-Alaska, that DOT should hold a public hearing or use an administrative law judge find out the facts in the case so that the public views its final decision as fair.