Following a threat of being grounded in June, Air Namibia has successfully met the requirements of the Directorate of Civil Aviation (DCA) and had its Air Operator Certificate (AOC) renewed, without any impact on its domestic, regional or international flights.
According to a statement issued by the airline, the Board was informed about 64 major findings since 2011 by the DCA that had yet to be resolved by the management of Air Namibia. The Board says it was only made aware of these three months ago when the DCA said that if the airline did not comply with the findings, the AOC would not be renewed and Air Namibia would be grounded.
The findings that urgently needed to be dealt with were the finalisation of all operational manuals, finalisation of the operational division’s organogram and the appointment of acceptable and competent post-holders as well as the finalisation of the correction action plan, according to the statement.
The airline says the DCA was satisfied that it had adequately resolved the findings and therefore granted Air Namibia the AOC.
Further, it said it would not share the reasons for the suspension of two of its senior managers as it believed this would be unprofessional. The statement said: “Their suspensions do not mean that they are dismissed but are on suspension to allow for smooth investigation and once these investigations are completed, the Board will advise on the way forward.”
In line with one of the major findings, Air Namibia has also appointed six new “competent post-holders”, four of which were existing employees, while two others were headhunted and brought into the organisation on six- to 12-month employment contract. The Board said: “They are coming to transfer skills and empower the understudies so that, moving forward, we have our local employees taking over.”
