Ghanaian aviation news site, AviationGhana has reported that the country’s government favours Egyptair’s partnership proposal for the creation of a new national carrier for the country. The government reportedly has concerns over the plans Ethiopian Airlines put forward.
Ethiopian Airlines has been extremely public, however, about its plans for the Ghanaian national airline. Back in early-December 2018, Ghanaian Aviation Minister Joseph Kofi Adda and Ethiopian Airlines CEO Tewolde Gebremariam signed a Memorandum of Understanding to launch the country’s new national airline.
In a linked development, Ghana placed an order for 3 Boeing 787-9 jets in November last year. The country also signed a Letter of Intent with De Havilland for 6 Dash-8-400 turboprops.
Kofi Adda, at the time of the Boeing order, said: “There is a growing demand for air travel to and from Ghana and we believe the advanced 787-9 Dreamliner gives us an efficient and flexible machine to launch a regional network and eventually serve international destinations in the future.”
Plans at the time were to launch a national airline based in Accra which would serve cities in West Africa, taking advantage of the capital’s strategic geographical location. The airline would later expand to “destinations in Europe, North America and Asia and the long-term plan is to open the airline to private investment and operation.”
However, it became clear that Ethiopian Airlines has set its sights on restarting national airlines across Africa, which may have been a contributing factor to the government’s lack of enthusiasm in the carrier’s proposal. The airline is also partnering with the governments of Chad and Zambia for instance for their national airlines. Meanwhile, Ethiopian Airlines also operates a secondary hub in Togo. Togo’s capital, Lomé, is located a mere four hours away from Accra by car.
AviationGhana says “the choice of Ethiopian Airlines as the strategic partner was held back due to a lack of agreement over key issues such as routes and tenure of the management contract.”
The next steps with regards to the Egyptair deal include the signing of a Memorandum of Understanding which is expected to be completed in the coming days, before being submitted to parliament for approval. The latter part of the process could take a number of weeks.
