Govt plans 8 aircraft for NAC in six months
KATHMANDU, OCT 17 -
The government has stepped up efforts to procure aircraft for ailing national flag carrier Nepal Airlines Corporation (NAC), directing the Ministry of Culture, Tourism and Civil Aviation (MoCTCA) and the Ministry of Finance to conclude process within six months. The government has also warned that failure to conclude the process would result in removal of concerned officials from their responsibilities.
The Immediate Governance and Economy Development Action Plan 2012, unveiled by the Prime Minister’s Office on Tuesday, directed the two ministries to procure two aircraft for international and six for domestic fleet of NAC.
The government’s directive has come at a time when every previous effort of NAC to purchase new aircraft had mired into controversy. As a result, the public enterprise has been unable to add a single aircraft to its fleet since the last two decades. NAC, which boasted a total of 19 aircraft a couple of decades ago, has just five aircraft now. The first of NAC’s two Boeing 757s for international flights had arrived in 1987.
“The concerned officials are directed to initiate the procurement process within a month and procure the aircraft within six months. Failure to which will result in them being relieved from their responsibilities,” the action plan draft reads.
According to government officials, NAC has begun another fresh process in its seemingly endless quest to buy aircraft. The move by the national flag carrier to expand its international fleet follows the Cabinet’s nod on Aug 1 to procure narrow-body jets.
The NAC board had on Friday directed the management to conduct an analysis of its route, market and business before placing an order for the planes. The government has agreed to act as a guarantor for the planned purchase.
The NAC officials said that the board was studying legal matters that possibly could arise if the new process was started without terminating the old one. The board has decided to sought advice from legal experts as well as other stakeholders on ways to terminate the old process. On Oct 26, 2009, the NAC board had decided to purchase two aircraft from Airbus—an A320-200 (narrow body) and an A330-200 (wide body). However, the purchase plan ran into dispute and it was cancelled following the directive of the now defunct parliamentary Public Accounts Committee on Dec 28, 2009.
Subsequently on May 25, 2010, the Ministry of Finance asked the Ministry of Culture, Tourism and Civil Aviation (MoCTCA) to scrap the entire purchase process. The plan was revived again on Dec 29, 2011.
NAC invites Airbus for talks
The Nepal Airlines Corporation (NAC) has invited France-based Airbus SAS for talks on the status of a memorandum of understanding (MoU) that the two companies had signed on November 6, 2009. A highly-placed NAC source said that the corporation’s board meeting had on Friday approved the decision to call Airbus to sort out the prevailing legal matters in the event the deal is scrapped. NAC and its line ministry have not scrapped the deal formally, fearing legal implications.
Source: The Kathmandu Post
