Jetlink’s day in court this Friday as airline defends against winding up petition

JETLINK’S CREDITORS TO MEET IN COURT AS DECISION LOOMS

Information from Nairobi has confirmed that this Friday, 10th of May, will be a crucial day for Jetlink, once Kenya’s leading private jet airline, as creditors will have their say on a winding up petition filed by the company’s aviation fuel supplier Finnjet. While Jetlink has maintained their struggle to find a partner to resume operations, this has not yet borne concrete fruits and discussions with FastJet have reportedly ended when the British owned airline agreed with Fly 540 to bury their hatchets and end their mutual court cases in favour of a negotiated settlement.

Jetlink was financially crippled when South Sudan’s Central Bank denied banks in Juba permission to remit Jetlink’s ticket sales funds – Juba has been their foremost regional route with three flights a day – to Nairobi, and with over 2 million US Dollars stuck in South Sudan’s banks the company eventually ran out of cash and had to halt operations. Interventions sought from the Kenyan government too apparently had little effect, as South Sudan was at the brink of being broke after halting oil exports in a dispute with Khartoum Sudan.

It is understood that Jetlink’s lawyers will oppose the winding up petition vigorously on Friday, as hope is rising now that with the resumption of oil exports via Port Sudan, the South Sudan Central Bank may be in a position to approve the funds transfer, which in turn would permit Jetlink to start settling dues to creditors, which also includes an aircraft leasing company, Civil Aviation and airport authorities for navigation, landing and parking fees, suppliers and staff, among others. ‘One can of course fault them for not more vigorously pursuing their remittances from South Sudan or opting for other means of payment for their tickets, but fundamentally Jetlink was a sound company before the South Sudanese messed them up. In fact, Jetlink is just one of many victims of Kenyan companies supplying goods and services and not being paid by Southern Sudan companies on grounds of their Central Bank refusing remittances. Our new government has to tell those chaps that they cannot join the EAC until they behave civil and meet financial obligations, because otherwise, what they did, is daylight robbery sanctioned by their state. Jetlink was an important element in domestic air operations and if and when they get their money back, maybe they can resume operations again. The problem will be to get some of their staff back because especially pilots and technicians are in high demand and from what I gather several of them have found new jobs and would not be available to fly for Jetlink again. I wish them good luck in court and hope all will end well for them’ contributed a regular aviation source from Nairobi, highlighting again the root causes for the unenviable situation Jetlink is now in. Watch this space for updated information on the ongoing court case as and when details are available.