KENYA CAA ‘DEFERS’ FASTJET APPLICATION FOR AIR SERVICE LICENCE
(Posted 25thOctober 2014)
Information received from Nairobi, where the Kenya Civil Aviation Authority held a public licensing meeting to hear applications for new air service licenses, and renewals of course, indicates that the highly anticipated Fastjet agenda item was deferred.
Ordinarily a deferral in such circumstances indicates that the regulators were either unable, or unwilling to deal with the matter at hand, and there is speculation if KCAA has asked Fastjet to provide additional information to back up their application or else succumbed to objections which were raised by Kenyan air operators worried what the entry of Fastjet would do to their market share. The next licensing hearing is likely to take place in early 2015 at which stage all eyes will be on the Kenyan CAA to see if they will, or will not, grant a license to Fastjet to fly domestic and regional services out of Nairobi.
It is also understood that the Tanzania Civil Aviation Authority is now counting down days during which Kenyan aviation authorities must respond to the Fastjet Tanzania application to fly from Dar es Salaam to Nairobi, kept pending without a decision now for several months. An aviation source from Dar es Salaam was swift to react to the news from Nairobi today and had this to say: ‘I am not sure how much longer the Tanzanians are going to wait. They have designated Fastjet as their second airline on the route to Nairobi. If the application is kept on hold for much longer there will be consequences. The theatre today with the deferral is typical of a regulatory authority wanting to keep competition away from their domestic market. Fastjet now carries over 60.000 pax per month from Dar and of course that must scare some of the Kenyan domestic airlines. But aviation is about reciprocity and that will kick in very soon. Their attempt to start an airline in Kenya is not directly related to their operation in Tanzania but blocking them from flying from Dar to Nairobi, that is turning into a confrontation. Tanzania has just licensed an airline with roots in Kenya so for a change it is not us here blocking regional integration’, taking a further dig at the constant tits for tats on the EAC platform between the two countries.
Sources close to Fastjet have also confirmed that there is progress in setting up a new operation in Zambia though no date has yet been given when Fastjet Zambia may take to the skies.
Watch this space for breaking and regular aviation news from across Eastern Africa.
