According to the Antigua and Barbuda government, negotiations are underway between LIAT (2020) Limited and the court-appointed administrator of the inter-regional airline, LIAT (1974), to purchase the insolvent airline’s assets.
The press throughout the English-speaking Caribbean has carried stories indicating that LIAT is a crucial development partner throughout the Caribbean and must be resuscitated, according to a statement issued following Thursday’s Cabinet meeting.
“Other states have been pursuing the establishment of another airline that would not compete on LIAT’s Routes; however, LIAT (2020) is more than a year ahead of its competitors in its planning to replace LIAT (1974) Ltd. and is likely to outperform them.”
The Antigua and Barbuda government is the primary shareholder in LIAT (2020), and it has already stated that it is willing to invest between $15 and $20 million in the new business.
According to the statement made following the Cabinet meeting, the new airline “will have a total of six planes and would have already secured the Air Operating Certificate (AOC).”
The Cabinet also invited the Development Commissioner to its meeting, who has been tasked with negotiating the terms of the final agreement between LIAT (2020) Ltd. and the principals of Air Peace, a private Nigerian airline founded in 2013, “for the purpose of establishing a governing agreement between both carriers.”
The statement comes after St. Vincent and the Grenadines Prime Minister Dr. Ralph Gonsalves revealed on Tuesday that he had received a document describing a plan for the financing and management of a regional airline from the Barbados-based Caribbean Development Bank (CDB).
Gonsalves told a news conference in Kingstown that the airline’s first shareholders may be the governments of the Organization of Eastern Caribbean States (OECS), but that “we would have to engage the Caribbean Development Bank on this exercise as well.”
Antigua and Barbuda, Dominica, Grenada, St. Lucia, St. Vincent and the Grenadines, St. Kitts-Nevis, Montserrat, Anguilla, and the British Virgin Islands comprise the OECS.
While the location of the airline’s headquarters has not been addressed, Gonsalves stated that he is “offering” St. Vincent and the Grenadines as one of the choices.
At a post-cabinet press conference, Information Minister Melford Nicholas told reporters that plans to build a new regional airline demonstrated exactly where Gonsalves “had always stood.”
He stated that Gonsalves hopes to increase traffic at his country’s international airport by launching a new airline with a sub-regional hub in Kingstown that will serve the Windward islands of Dominica, St. Lucia, St. Vincent and the Grenadines, and Grenada.
Despite financial help from sub-regional governments, Nicholas stated that St. John’s is working hard to ensure that LIAT (2020) gets operational and will not be distracted.
The Antiguan government’s declaration comes as the Antigua and Barbuda Workers Union (ABWU) has asked the court-appointed administrator, Cleveland Seaforth, to give the public with an update on the company’s future path.
The ABWU’s general secretary, David Massiah, stated that efforts are being made to secure severance payouts for employees of the airline, which went bankrupt in July 2020 due to growing debt and the impact of the coronavirus (COVID-19) epidemic.
The airline is owned by the governments of Antigua and Barbuda, Barbados, Dominica, and St. Vincent and the Grenadines, and while the governments of Barbados and St. Lucia have made funds available to cover the three-year outstanding debt to employees in their respective countries, the same has not been done for employees on the other islands.
“It is troubling to us in the Antigua and Barbuda Workers Union that we continue to call on the Prime Minister of Antigua and Barbuda (Gaston Browne) to ensure that Seaforth, the LIAT administrator, declares to the public on his administration’s yielding over the last three years.”
“At the very least, the administrator should inform the public about the yielding of his administration, which has lasted three years (and) was supposed to take 120 days.”
“As a result, we condemn the government’s and the administrator’s silence or dismissal, as we have yet to receive some sort of understanding as to how things can move forward.”
The union official demanded that Seaforth “clearly disclose to us what the situations are, where we are, so people have an understanding because the people of LIAT who have been working are entitled to their rights, their severance are protected by international convention.”
