Sri Lanka’s national airline faces even more headwinds than many of its competitors.
Airlines around the world have been rocked by the impact of countries closing their borders during the pandemic and soaring fuel prices due to the Ukraine war.
The state-owned SriLankan Airlines is also facing the worst economic crisis in decades in its home country.
The British-born boss told the BBC how he intends to transform the company.
“I think the first lesson for me is never to become CEO during Covid,” jokes SriLankan Airlines chief executive Richard Nuttall when asked what he has taken away the most from the past two years.
Mr. Nuttall has spent decades in the airline industry, working with names such as Cathay Pacific and Philippines Airlines.
He became chief executive of SriLankan Airlines in April last year after joining the company as chief commercial officer in November 2021.
He joined the loss-making airline after Sri Lanka eased its border restrictions due to the coronavirus and hopes were high that the company would see a recovery in passenger numbers.
However, in the summer of 2021, the economic problems that had been plaguing the country before the pandemic worsened.
A series of government missteps led to the country’s worst economic crisis since independence, depleting Sri Lanka’s foreign exchange reserves needed to import everything from food to fuel.
Soaring prices prompted protesters to take to the streets, hurting the tourism industry vital to the country’s economy.
Countries discouraging their citizens from traveling to Sri Lanka would smack of “double standards,” Mr Nuttall said.
“In the West, protest is a sign of democracy and nobody issues travel advice.
In February, Sri Lanka secured a $3 billion (£2.4 billion) bailout from the International Monetary Fund.
As part of a plan to rebuild the shattered economy, the government plans to raise funds through the privatization of SriLankan Airlines.
In February this year, the company was unable to make interest payments due at the end of the year and defaulted on a $175 million (£140 million) bond issue.
Mr Nuttall stressed that while he was not opposed to the sale of the company, there was still work to be done to restructure the debt before that could happen.
“If we can structure this debt, a large part of what we pay as interest comes back and can be used to run the airline,” he said.
“And it means an outside investor can step in and not have to pay for past sins.”
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