Airzim chefs fired as fuel shortages ground entire fleet

By Tererai Karimakwenda and Violet Gonda
22 November 2005

The government controlled paper The Herald reported Tuesday that Air Zimbabwe had grounded its entire fleet on Monday after running out of fuel. The board immediately suspended chief executive Dr Tendai Mahachi and the divisional director for finance and company secretary Mrs Tendai Mujuru. According to The Herald, all flights were cancelled until further notice and investigations into flight disruptions are pending. Captain Oscar Madombwe was appointed the acting group chief executive officer until further notice.

On Tuesday afternoon the troubled airline is reported to have received a shipment of fuel. Flights were resumed but the suspended officials who were blamed for the shortages will not return pending results of the investigations.

Our Harare correspondent Simon Muchemwa reports that there was chaos at Harare Airport as people who had already purchased tickets arrived to find they were not flying at all. He said the problem was a lack of jet fuel and spare parts for repairs, and that the CEO Dr Mahachi was being blamed for it. But Muchemwa added that the airline has also been plagued by a reduced number of passengers due to the exhorbitant prices they were charging for tickets. A roundtrip ticket to the UK now costs at least 140 million Zim dollars and fares were always rising.

He said many domestic and regional flights were not making money and Air Zim had tried to channel its resources to international flights that bring foreign currency. That strategy had apparently not saved the airline either. Muchemwa said the flights were still not as fully booked as they used to be. Earlier this year, we reported how the airline flew from Dubai to Harare with only one person on board when the plane can carry more than 200 passengers.

Air Zimbabwe passengers have also been very unhappy with the service in general lately. We interviewed passengers some months back who said toilets on many planes were not functional. On several occasions, passengers were left stranded when planes were diverted to accommodate Robert Mugabe and his entourage. And it seems this is still happening.

Last Thursday many passengers to Zimbabwe were left behind at Gatwick Airport in the UK, when an Air Zimbabwe plane left, allegedly, to pick up Robert Mugabe from Tunisia. One of the affected passengers also told us that many people were left behind as some had been given tickets with the wrong departure time. Those who tried to take the Saturday plane, which was supposed to leave at 6pm, were again stranded and slept in the corridors at Gatwick as the plane only left 10 hours later, at 4am. The airline had no fuel.

It is the fuel shortages and lack of spare parts that have brought the airline to its knees. The Herald said numerous turnaround strategies have failed.