Mozambique to grant 9 airports to private management

MAPUTO. - The Mozambican government plans to surrender management of nine national airports to private companies as a way of improving services and attracting more customers, an official said on Friday.

Mozambique Airlines (LAM) board of directors president Emanuel Chaves said; “With the concession of the airports to the private management, it is intended to ensure the efficient management of the infrastructure of Mozambican airports and attract foreign airlines.”

Chaves said some small airports would be ceded first to better study the strategies.

In 2014, LAM, the country’s only airline, was banned from flying over the European space for two years due to non-compliance with international security rules.

“The public-private strategy is what we are going to follow in order to improve the infrastructure of our airports and offer better prices to passengers,” Chaves said, adding that the competition among operators was going to dictate the setting of custom tariffs.

Chaves admitted that the custom tariff of services that LAM provided was high, and many customers had complained about it.

“Mozambique is implementing custom tariff liberalisation, depending on new companies that will enter to operate in the domestic market,” he said without mentioning specific names of the new companies.

He said the move was aimed at enabling the airports to meet international standards. - New Ziana.