In the event that the PIA strike is prolonged the proposal to establish a new airline may be considered with the objective of facilitating passengers, Chairman Board of Investment (BoI) Dr Miftah Ismail told Business Recorder. According to details, the new airline would, if required, be established within 90 days to 120 days. It will operate planes on the basis of wet lease and services of the crew, staff and other human resources will be acquired through outside sources. Total strength of the company will be from 500 to 600 employees.
The government will run the new company like an autonomous corporation and look after its management while in practice it will be like a private company. The new airline will operate separate from PIA. An Aviation expert, Farrukh Majeed, told Business Recorder that the government has to follow the standard operating procedure prescribed in manual of Air Operator Certificate (AOC) which grants international destinations on the basis of one year performance of domestic flight operation of any new airline.
Currently, Air Blue, Shaheen Air and Etihad Airways are ''facilitating'' PIA passengers bound for local and international airports. The top management of the national carrier PIA on Thursday initiated measures to protect the airline from further losses and asked private airlines to accept PIA''s confirmed passengers for domestic and international flights. The PIA management is also trying to make a deal with a Turkish airline for confirmed international passengers, but so far no agreement has been reached. Meanwhile, the federal government decided not to hold talks with the strikers, who have stopped PIA''s flight operations; and has formed a four-member panel to initiate action against strikers under the Pakistan Essential Services (Maintenance) Act 1952. More than 7,000 to 8,000 passengers have missed their flights in the wake of the stand-off between the Joint Action Committee and the federal government and according to law they are entitled to refunds on their tickets, an official of PIA management said.