Your suspension is a deposit, not a final victory — miss the annulment action and it evaporates
The Council of State automatically lifts a previously granted suspension because Eloy Travaux failed to file an annulment action after the 20 January 2025 suspension, and orders the contractor to bear the costs.
What happened?
On 20 January 2025, the Council of State had suspended in judgment 262.034 the execution of an award decision by the Opérateur de Transport de Wallonie (OTW), which awarded a €19,425,093.54 contract including VAT — divided into 15 lots, including lot 2 on private infrastructure (sewerage, roads, surroundings, fencing, parks to the north and a cycle/pedestrian link to the east) — to the joint venture SSM Galère-Duchène. The suspension had been granted in an extreme urgency phase or under ordinary suspension procedure — before an annulment action was filed. Then something crucial happened: Eloy Travaux failed to file an annulment action within the legal deadline. The award decision can therefore no longer be annulled. Article 17, §4, paragraph 3 of the coordinated laws on the Council of State is strict in such a case: a suspension granted before the annulment procedure must immediately be lifted if no annulment action based on the same grounds that justified the suspension is filed within the deadline. The Council applies this rule mechanically: suspension lifted, Eloy Travaux treated as the losing party and pays €200 in roll fees, €24 contribution and €770 procedural indemnity to OTW — €994 in total. The contracting authority can now simply execute the contract.
Why does this matter?
A suspension judgment feels like a victory, and procedurally it is — but only as an intermediate step. Many contractors underestimate that legally a suspension is not an endpoint: it blocks execution, nothing more. To actually undo the contested decision, you must file an annulment action within the deadline (60 days from becoming aware) raising the same grounds. If you let that deadline lapse, the suspension disappears with no further recourse — and you pay the other party's costs. That is precisely the scenario here.
The lesson
If you obtain a suspension: mark the annulment deadline immediately in your own agenda and your counsel's. A suspension without a follow-up annulment action within the deadline is legally worthless. Work systematically on the dual-track principle: (1) challenge/obtain the suspension and (2) file the annulment action — either simultaneously or within the deadline after the suspension ruling. Build in an internal check so that no suspension ruling is checked off before the accompanying annulment action is confirmed and filed.
Ask yourself
When your counsel tells you a suspension ruling has gone your way: is the deadline for the annulment action in your agenda, and is there an internal owner of that follow-up? Or do you think the case is finished with the suspension?
About this database
The Council of State (Raad van State / Conseil d'État) is Belgium's supreme administrative court. In disputes over public procurement — from contract awards to tenderer exclusions — the Council of State is the final arbiter. The rulings in this database are summarised by TenderWolf in plain language, with practical lessons for tenderers and contracting authorities. View all rulings →