Pakistan International Airline’s (PIA) Acting Chief Executive Officer, Nayyar Hayat, has blamed Gulf based Airlines and the misuse of open sky policy for the heavy losses incurred by the national airlines. He informed that PIA’s monthly loss is about Rs. 3.25 billion.
Nayyer Hayat was talking with aviation journalists during an informal gathering in a hotel at Karachi. He was given additional charge of acting CEO after the dismissal of Bernd Hildenbrand. He has been working as PIA’s Chief Financial Officer (CFO) for the past 3 years.
Hayat said that PIA is facing losses due to loans from the previous management and stiff competition with three gulf airlines. Due to its operational structure and small fleet, PIA is not able to compete with single hub airlines.
“PIA is flying point to point but our competitors can fly point to hub to destination. Gulf’s mega carriers board passengers for 50 destinations and bring them to their hub and place them in different flights.” he added.
Instead of an Open Sky policy the world is now talking about fair sky policy. American airlines have submitted a report to the US congress about losses due to the Open Sky policy.
“The report says that one daily wide body flight of foreign airline causes a loss of 700 jobs in the local market.” Nayyer told. He added that there is a dire need to improve the overall aviation sector in the country.
PIA’s Acting CEO said that PIA’s financial condition is not very good and the airline has to pay billions of rupees every month to pay back legacy loans and service charges, estimated at about Rs. 3,250 million. He also disclosed that PIA’s EU and USA flights are not suffering losses.
“To compete in the current market we are trying to change PIA’s operating module. We are connecting our domestic routes with international flights. Karachi will be connected to London via 2 direct flights and 5 indirect flights from Lahore and Islamabad. From May 15, Multan, Faisalabad, Peshawar will be connected with EU flights.” Mr. Nayyer told the media.
