Pakistan International Airlines (PIA) finance manager Omar Bin Sadat on Thursday, informed the National Assembly Standing Committee on Cabinet Secretariat that the organisation had Rs 341b of local and foreign liabilities as of June 30th last year. Sadat shared that local liabilities stood at Rs270b and foreign ones are over Rs71b.
The committee had called this meeting to discuss and inquire from PIA’s officials with respect to the Federal Investigation’s Authorities investigation into accusations of alleged corruption, commercial restructuring and discuss issues pertaining to dry and wet leases of aircrafts.
The committee Chairman Rana Mohammad Hayat Khan of PML-N voiced his anger at the PIA officials for coming unprepared and failing in providing satisfactory answers which were put forward by the members. The chairman stated that he had issued instructions to the secretary of the committee to file another complaint on part of the committee with the Prime Minister in respect to the non-seriousness of the PIA officials and coming unprepared for the meeting.
He directed the secretary of the committee to lodge another complaint on behalf of the committee with the prime minister regarding the officials’ poor performance and not taking the meeting seriously. As per PTI MNA Asad Omar, the organisation had made no progress in regards to its commercial restructuring and had more information in regards to it from last year than the officials had currently.
While briefing the parliamentarians, the Civil Aviation Authority (CAA) Director General Air Marshal Asim Suleman he said around five international organisations had expressed an interest in operating PIA airports. He also shared that these companies had immense expertise and experience in operating domestic as well as international airports but the regulatory control will remain with the CAA.
According to Suleman, the National Aviation Policy 2015 will permit the outsourcing of airports to renowned world class airport operators through a transparent and competitive process. He said the main aim was to ensure improvement in the operability and efficiency at major airports and bids from those offering the highest revenue share percentage will be given priority.
Suleman highlighted that the National Aviation Policy 2015 provided an opportunity for the outsourcing of airports to world-class airport operators of international standing through a transparent and competitive process. He maintained that the objective was to achieve better operability and enhanced efficiency at major airports.
