Antigua PM pledges to keep LIAT flying

Tuesday, April 6, 2004

ST. JOHN’S, Antigua: Prime Minister of Antigua and Barbuda, Baldwin Spencer, has pledged his government’s support to do everything in ensuring that LIAT stays afloat providing the critical service of assisting in uniting, strengthening and deepening the relationships of Caribbean peoples.

The Prime Minister made the remark following a meeting with a team lead by Prime Minister of St. Vincent and the Grenadines Dr Ralph Gonsalves, who is the chief spokesperson on Air Transportation matters in CARICOM; officials from LIAT and Minister of Tourism Harold Lovell and a technical team from Antigua and Barbuda’s Aviation department.

The country’s leader noted that his government recognizes that there are existing problems facing LIAT, however there have been changes made to its structure and there are other changes to be made to ensure that the airline remains a Caribbean Airline, owned and operated by the people and for the people of the Caribbean.

Over the past three years LIAT has made a number of reforms to make it become more efficient. It has trimmed its staff from over 1000 employees to 650 and has outsourced some of its functions.

Prime Minister Gonsalves said that he is fortified by the commitment of the Government of Prime Minister Spencer to keep LIAT flying and to carry on its restructuring and most importantly to seek to ensure that a nexus between LIAT and BWIA is realized by July 1 this year. An original deadline of January 1, 2004 for the merging of the two airlines under a holding company in Trinidad and Tobago did not materialize because of certain requisites on the part of BWIA.

The Spokesperson on CARICOM Air Transportation matters outlined that LIAT is critical to the Caribbean Community and there cannot be an effective community without communications. He said that air transportation is vital to communications and there is the need to have an airline over which Caribbean people have control and influence.

“We cannot leave another airline which will be a monopoly to decide when we travel and at what price. It would not be in the interest of independent peoples and the movement throughout the region and for the sustainability of the CARICOM Single Market and Economy,” noted Dr. Gonsalves.

Prime Minister Gonsalves in commenting on Prime Minister Spencer’s commitment to LIAT said that the UPP Government is standing as one with the other countries in CARICOM to fight the struggle to make sure that LIAT remains in the skies and remains profitable. He noted that Mr. Spencer, who will assume the Chairmanship of CARICOM shortly, is well placed to influence other leaders who are not committed to saving LIAT.

Prime Minister Spencer in his comment after the meeting also called upon his CARICOM colleagues to find a common ground in ensuring that LIAT remains a Caribbean airline serving the people of the region efficiently.

“I will be consulting with other CARICOM leaders to emphasize the importance of all of us working together and creating the modalities that will allow for LIAT to continue to serve the region and serve it well, because it is our airline created by the people. We must use LIAT as a showpiece of the togetherness, the unity and the ability to create institutions and make them work for the people of the region,” Mr. Spencer outlined.

Tourism Minister Harold Lovell who was also in the meeting, said that LIAT remains critical to the abiding spirit of Caribbean people, noting that it is not only an airline but an institution which has served the people of this region for a long time and regional governments cannot allow it to die.

He noted that LIAT is important to the region’s tourism sector and inter-island travel and the people of the Caribbean should not be left in a state where they are put to the mercy of one airline. “We cannot sit and preside over the demise of LIAT. We must do all that it possible to keep it flying,” Lovell added.

Antigua and Barbuda is among four CARICOM countries (Barbados, St. Vincent and the Grenadines and Trinidad and Tobago), which are committed to restructuring LIAT. The airline has amassed a huge debt of over 200 million dollars since being privatized in 1996-97. Over 70 million dollars of that debt is owed to the suppliers of its aircraft, Export Development Corporation of Canada.

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