BRIDGETOWN, Barbados, March 31 2015 – Chairman of the Antigua-based carrier, LIAT, Dr. Jean Holder said he was focused only on carrying out the mandate of the shareholder governments – Barbados, Antigua and Barbuda, St Vincent and the Grenadines and Dominica – that all agreed on a restructuring plan for the airline when they met in Bridgetown on February 13.
“These are the only proposals that are engaging my attention. I had a meeting of the board on March 26, which is last Thursday, in Antigua. It was attended by all the directors, including three directors from Antigua and Barbuda, and those three directors included two ministers who, as far as I know, sit in the Cabinet of the government of Antigua,” he stressed.
“I certainly as chairman of LIAT reemphasised our obligation to implement the mandate that was given to us here in Barbados on February 13 and all of the directors there, including the Antiguans, agreed with that approach and that is what I am very intensely engaged in at the present moment.”
“I am not going to be distracted by rumours here and rumours there about what I or the board or the shareholders are doing,” Dr Holder added.
The LIAT chairman acknowledged that the agreed restructuring proposal would be painful and even though the overhaul meant sending home staff it had to be done.
“It is not something that one likes to do, but it is something which we agreed to do and I have no choice but to do it. I see the matter that was ratified on February 13 as the solution to stabilising LIAT. I think we all agreed at that meeting that that’s the way we ought to go. Everybody that came to that meeting agreed that was the way to go,” he insisted.
Holder dismissed a proposal that Barbados set up its own airline with 10 planes and up to 350 permanent staff to replace LIAT as a distraction.
Antigua and Barbuda’s Prime Minister Gaston Browne, in a radio interview in Antigua, said he planned to meet with LIAT’s chief executive officer David Evans to find out where the proposal for a Barbados airline originated and if he discovered that the carrier’s boss “hatched” the new plan he would be demanding his resignation.
