ZIMCODD Criticises Government For Appointment Of Air Zimbabwe Board
The Zimbabwe Coalition on Debt and Development (ZIMCODD) has criticised the government for appointing a six-member board at the national airliner Air Zimbabwe.
In a statement seen by NewsDay Zimbabwe, ZIMCODD said the government was missing the point by appointing a board at Air Zimbabwe which has been struggling for over two decades.
On Monday, Transport minister Felix Mhona appointed a six-member board chaired by Silvano Gwarinda, whose members are Ruth Raina Hungwe-Rukarwa, Edmund Murambiwa Makona, Lawrence Simbarashe Musendekwa, Ticharwa Garabga and Mucharemba Kahombe. ZIMCODD said in a statement yesterday:
Air Zimbabwe needs structural reforms and political will and not board appointments.
In 1980, Air Zimbabwe was regarded as one of the best airlines in Africa competing on international routes. Currently, Air Zimbabwe services domestic routes such as Victoria Falls and Bulawayo and has been booted out of the international routes due to archaic and dilapidating airlines except for Johannesburg, Dar es Salaam and other regional destinations.
It is rather worrying that for a country that has ambitions of attaining an upper middle-class economy by 2030 it does not have a single inter-continental airline… In 2018, the state airline was put under the administration of Grant Thornton in terms of the Reconstruction of State-Indebted Insolvent Companies Act (Chapter 24:27) from the 4th of October to the 30th of June 2021. This was an attempt to redress the challenges that the parastatal was encountering.
ZIMCODD added that the appointment of six members after the purchase of one 50-seater jet does not show government sincerity in revamping the state airline.
