Africa World Airlines (AW, Accra) has reiterated its desire to partner the Ghanaian government in the establishment of a new national carrier which will be based on a Public-Private Partnership (PPP). The news comes after Ghanaian Deputy Minister of Joyce Bawah-Mogtari said a final decision would only be taken once a comprehensive PricewaterhouseCoopers Ghana (PwC) report had been submitted.
“Chances are that it might be an existing airline with a seriously obvious brand… it might be one of our domestic carriers that is willing to partner government to bring back this airline," she told Joy News in an interview.
Bawah-Mogtari said that should all modalities be met, Accra plans to have the carrier up and running by March this year.
“Three months is a long time for a lot of things to happen and government has actually indicated its preparedness to this in the shortest possible time."
The Hainan Airlines (HU, Haikou) subsidiary has gone on record as stating it would be willing to partner government should the terms of any partnership prove commercially feasible.
"We have a business plan independent of government. So we will wait and look at the terms being offered by government if it makes financial and strategic sense for us to go into partnership with government, yes , [we] will [do] that," Africa World's Chief Operations Officer, Apiigy Afenu, said last year.
Using a trio of E145s, Africa World plies both domestic and regional flights. Plans to introduce A319-100s into the fleet late last year were deferred as a result of the Ebola outbreak in the region.
Accra's plan to launch its own state-backed carrier has met strong resistance from local operators Starbow Airlines (Accra) and Antrak Air (Accra) both of which claim the country's domestic market is too small and over-subscribed to sustain yet another competitor. Last year, Fastjet (Dar es Salaam) shut down its Fly540 Ghana (Accra) operation on the back of poor customer demand and high operating costs.
