For the successful contractor in the Persero case, this will be no doubt a bittersweet result as it took no less than two arbitration proceedings (known as Persero I and Persero II), two High Court decisions and two Court of Appeal decisions over a period of six years to reach that conclusion.

Contractors who have been following this long-running case will, however, welcome the decision due to the simplicity of the approach adopted by the 2015 Court of Appeal for the enforcement of DAB decisions, namely: the successful party may refer the paying party’s non-compliance with a DAB decision directly to arbitration, (i) without having to submit at the same time the merits of the DAB decision and also importantly, (ii) without first having to refer the paying party’s non-compliance as a secondary dispute back to the DAB.

Has the 2015 Court of Appeal decision finally provided the much needed clarity and certainty as to the steps required by a successful party to enforce a binding but non-final DAB decision? This is highly doubtful. The 2015 Court of Appeal decision in fact seems to add further confusion to the debate by endorsing an approach which differs from all the previous Persero decisions.

In this article, the author will examine the reasoning behind the 2015 Court of Appeal decision, which considered a second referral to the DAB of the dispute over the paying party’s non-compliance to be “superfluous”, and highlight what difficulties a winning party may face if it adopts the simple approach endorsed by the 2015 Court of Appeal. The author will then conclude with some practical recommendations in relation to the