AIR ZIMBABWE POSTS US$24M LOSS
HARARE - Government’s plans to revive flag carrier Air Zimbabwe (AirZim) are dead in the water for now after it failed to secure partnerships with reputable airlines that were put off by the massive debts at the struggling airline.
At present government has no money to bail out the haemorrhaging AirZim which this year made a loss of $24 million.
“There is nothing to expect from that front (reviving AirZim) unless we get money. For now, it’s a sinking company.
“For example, AirZim asks government to purchase fuel for it on a daily basis and it cannot run on its own,’’ Transport minister Joram Gumbo told the Daily News in an exclusive interview.
AirZim is currently saddled with a $300 million debt and was said to be making a $2 million loss every month.
Gumbo told the Daily News that government had pursued partnerships with reputable airlines but these fell through as a result of the financial problems at the national airline.
He said contrary to widespread reports that the new airline Zimbabwe Airways (Zim Airways) was a government project established to replace AirZim, the airline was privately-owned and had nothing to do with them.
Gumbo said Zim Airways is actually run by a private company known as Zimbabwe Aviation Leasing Company (ZALC) and government’s role was to facilitate the deal after initial efforts to revive AirZim fell through.
He told the Daily News he had personally courted Zimbabweans living in London and Dubai to invest in the Zimbabwean aviation industry.
“Cabinet approved the recapitalisation of AirZim. After the approval, we went around to negotiate with at least 12 airlines which included two African airlines, Ethiopian Airways and Kenyan Airways.
“We also targeted Air Malaysia, Lufthansa, Qatar Airlines, Turkish Airlines, Emirates Airways, Qantas Airways, Singapore Airways and China Air but we discovered that we were not going to succeed in our negotiations because AirZim’s financials are in shambles and they were not attractive to any one of the airlines to try and go into partnership with us,” Gumbo told the Daily News.