Dominica hotelier, Gregor Nassief, is urging St. Vincent & the Grenadines Prime Minister, Ralph Gonsalves, to step aside as chairman of the shareholder’s committee of regional airline LIAT, in a fourth open letter to the shareholders.
Nassief insists that since Gonsalves believes LIAT can never be profitable, then the airline urgently needs a new chairman and ‘general’ who can find a new approach for taking LIAT and the Caribbean aviation industry forward without a perpetual and unfair burden on the treasuries of St. Vincent, Antigua, Barbados and Dominica.
The full letter, which was copied to prime minister, Roosevelt Skerrit, is below.
February 25, 2014
Honourable Dr. Ralph Gonsalves of St. Vincent and the Grenadines
LIAT (1974) LTD
V.C. Bird International Airport
P O Box 819
Coolidge
Antigua
Dear Prime Minister Gonsalves:
Re: Run it like a business before it goes out of business
On the televised program Time to Face the Facts on Sunday, February 23rd, I appealed to you to step aside as Chairman of the Shareholder’s committee of LIAT. As mentioned on the program, given the respect and admiration I have for you, particularly on your stance and leadership on issues such as reparations and the cholera outbreak in Haiti, it was personally difficult for me to do this. But it is necessary.
LIAT has moved from an operational meltdown in the Summer of 2013 to a financial meltdown a mere 7 months later. LIAT drains our treasuries, operates inefficiently and stifles competition. The source of LIAT’s problem is its financial unsustainability and as with everything else at LIAT, no one is accountable. As Chairman of the Shareholder’s committee, the buck stops with you.
LIAT needs to fight the battle of its life to transform itself to be financially viable and sustainable. But you believe, and have stated so publicly, that LIAT can never be profitable. This battle, therefore, needs a different general.
Unsustainability
LIAT has lost ec$120m in the last four years. Last month, LIAT could not pay both the lease on its aircraft as well as its payroll. So it chose one and delayed the other. A leased ATR gives 36% more seat capacity than its closest Dash 8 equivalent but is double the (lease) expense. In 2015, repayments will begin on LIAT’s recent loan of us$65m to purchase new aircraft. So monthly cash outflows go up even more.
And the new inflows to cover this? Inter-island tourism is down 60% in 7 years and LIAT’s load factor is running at about 55%. The fantasy (aka “business plan”) is that the load factor will go up to 75%. The fantasy is also that LIAT will fly its way out of losses by expanding to new destinations – Jamaica, Haiti, Aruba, Panama, and eventually to cities in North and South America.
LIAT employs 850+ people, flies 22 destinations, operates between 10 and 12 aircraft from 2 hubs (3 if you count Trinidad) to move 800,000+ passengers a year to generate massive losses.
So it’s bail out time again. Call on shareholders, and call on other good neighbors so that we can continue to drain our treasuries, operate inefficiently and stifle competition. And for you this is acceptable because LIAT should not be run like a business and can never make a profit.
Our fragile economies can no longer support perpetual bailouts. If we do not take the bull by the horns LIAT will go out of business – it will employ no one, fly nowhere, operate no aircraft and use no hubs. But alas, it will generate no losses and competitive players will fill the gaps because LIAT, the airline unfairly propped up by perpetual subsidies, will not be there to run them out of business.
LIAT must therefore immediately begin a journey towards financial sustainability to save itself. But if the leader does not believe in the journey, then the journey will never begin. It is on this basis, with full respect and admiration, that I ask you to step aside as Chairman of the Shareholder’s committee, so that a new mandate to make LIAT financially sustainable can be ushered in.
Sustainability
The new chairman of the Shareholder’s committee needs to believe that the battle can be won. And what needs to be done is not rocket science.
Appoint a Chairman and a Board capable of turning around the financial fortunes of the company and running a top-notch airline. Give them the authority and autonomy to do what needs to be done. Allow them to appoint a CEO and restructure the management team as necessary. Allow LIAT to become a real business free from political interference tasked with a perfect safety record, high employee satisfaction, great customer service and solid financial performance. A fierce focus on the company’s finances with adjustments made to yield (including renegotiation of government/airport taxes), network efficiency and operating costs will be required. The resulting operation will have fewer employees, fewer destinations and fewer aircraft. It will be profitable, dependable and it will deliver great service. Like any airline, unprofitable routes will continue only with guarantees from the interested party/government. But at least then, the taxpayers will know what they are paying for, and can make that decision. And other/smaller airlines will take up the slack. Competition will flourish, as will LIAT, and the Caribbean will finally get the airlift network it needs.
With a restructured board and executive, confidence in the airline’s financial performance will be established and other Caribbean governments may even want to invest.
At the right time, joint venture the company while maintaining a minimum 50% shares among shareholder governments. The two best run airlines in the world (Singapore Airlines and Air Malaysia) are run like a business and are profitable and remain owned 50% or more by the State and 50% or less by private interests. Like LIAT, they were bleeding losses and their shareholder governments could no longer manage the bailouts. So they took the tough decisions, appointed the right board and executive team, and turned the airlines around to the benefit of all stakeholders.
Yes, it will be painful, but it is necessary. And most importantly it will pull LIAT back from the financial cliff and put it on a course to long term financial sustainability.
Please consider that I am a hotelier from an island that is almost 80% dependent on LIAT for airlift. Cut one route to Dominica, and we/Dominica will suffer. But if my option is (a) to continue to have all the LIAT routes we have today with an airline that is prone to poor service, ad hoc cancellations, occasional and irrational pilot strikes and constantly at the edge of a financial precipice due to insurmountable financial losses – OR – (b) an airline with fewer routes but with good service, dependable schedules and solid financial performance, then my choice is definitely the latter. And other airlines, once permitted, will take up the slack.
In Summary
Thomas Edison said, “I have not failed. I’ve just found 10,000 ways that won’t work.” And then finally, he invented the electric light bulb.
We have lived through and exhausted the many ways that LIAT won’t work. It is time to try the way that will.
I appeal to you, Prime Minister Gonsalves, as well as the other Shareholder Prime Ministers, to mandate a new approach for taking LIAT and the Caribbean aviation industry forward without this perpetual and unfair burden on our treasuries.
It is time to run it like a business before it goes out of business.
Respectfully Yours,
Gregor Nassief
Owner/Director – Secret Bay
Executive Chairman – Fort Young Hotel
cc: Honourable Dr. Baldwin Spencer of Antigua and Barbuda
Honourable Freundel Stuart of Barbados
Honourable Roosevelt Skerrit of Dominica
p.s. As we again desperately seek additional funds for yet another bailout, make it the last please. Don’t put the money into the black hole of an unsustainable business model. Instead, use it to restructure the airline, rationalize its operations and place it on a solid long term footing. In other words, make it the last bailout!
The businessman is almost extinct in the caribbean.
Well Dominicans better learn how to swim
Dear Mr Nassief
I was at Fort young having dinner for news years day and had to wait two hours to get served, and my meal came in an hour. Please improve your service in Fort Young, it was not like this when your father was running it.
Best Regards
It needs to go out of business so that a better replacement can be had.
Well said Mr Nassief concerning LIAT now let s lobby for direct air service from the US mainland . Can jet blue be the answer with the many type of aircraft?
DNO: I posted the following nearly 24 hours ago and I notice it’s still awaiting moderation. Any reason it’s being held?
Mr. Nassief has presented a rather simplistic solution to a very complex issue. The issue here is not Liat but a reliable, affordable air transport system for the Caribbean. I’m no fan of Liat – goodness knows the level of poor service I have received from mainly their ground crew (I think their flight attendants are among the warmest, most welcoming anywhere)- but it can’t be as easy as what Mr. Nassief proposed. After all, if it were don’t you think it would have been done already in the more than 55 years the airline has been around.
Think for a minute of what’s being proposed here. If Liat were to follow the capitalistic recommendations, Liat would have to drop several routes, probably including Dominica. Over the past two weeks, I flew into and out of Dominica four times. The highest number of passengers to or from Dominica during these four trips was eight. ON one occasion there were two of us. If Liat were to operate strictly on a profit basis it would cut Dominica and several other routes. What, then, would happen? Do you really think that some other carrier would happily fly in to pick up the slack? What slack?
This is why Liat (or a Liat)has to operate as a social service. Yes, any such airline must be efficient but, I agree with Ralph Gonsalves that in monetary terms, it cannot be profitable. I believe all Caribbean governments ought to make a monetary contribution to the running or the airline which is the only one that connects the Caribbean and gives each destination a fighting chance with its tourism and allows the people of the Caribbean to move about. In the 55 years that Liat has been around, some 30 airlines have come and gone. Surely, some of these must have been owned and run by smart business people. And it’s not because of unfair competition from Liat because Liat’s fares are not lower, nor is its cost of doing business any lower. The powerful American pulled Eagle out, for heaven’s sake.
So, while Mr. Nassief is right to say we need Liat to provide good customer service and efficiently run, his formula, while it might result in a smaller airline, it will also be a meaner airline, and by meaner I mean it will have to cut off a lot of routes and reduce service to others. And where will that leave Dominicans? Stranded.
Instead, Liat (or a Liat), must be seen as a bridge. Something that connects the 22 countries to which it flies; an absolute necessity. NO one ever asks how profitable a bridge is. Everyone accepts that the bridge is essential, repairs it when it needs to be repaired and let it perform.
Well said!!!
I am always amazed when Dominicans in particular talk about this issue i.e. LIAT as private business. They are clueless to the fact that thanks to Government intervention over the years we get any flights at all! Dominica will be the first route to be dropped like a hot potato. Mr. Nassief didnt think that one through well at all.
And think of the islands like St lucia, Grenada and Antigua which pay millions and millions every year to subsidize the big airlines for empty airline seats to make sure these airlines keep up their flights to their islands. So these massive global airlines can get Government subsizidation but not little LIAT? LIAT which is also a major job provider to west indians.
LIAT as the business model Dominicans seem so hell bent on getting, the way things stand with Dominica now, will likely result in us paying LIAT every single day to land in Dominica. The paltry EC$8 million we have spent so far will be be a joke at the end of the day.
You are right. Mr. Nassief’s take is way too simple.
Dominica can start to talk about LIAT as a business model as soon as we get arrivals way up to ensure we are not dropped as a route. So Mr. Nassief should write a letter to his own PM asking for a far more aggressive marketing plan and budget for the island.
The OECS can start to talk about LIAT as a business model as soon as we stop subzidizing the big foreign airlines.
This is the sort of debate I’d like us to have. Too often we allow our emotion to speak for us instead of our heads, too often we speak, not from facts but from feelings, too often we simply don’t have a clue. We need to examine how Liat functions, the cost of tickets versus that of Caribbean Airlines, the cost of operating a small airline in the Caribbean. We need to find out what the options are, explore why so many airlines have failed, all of them private airlines, run like businesses. We need to be aware of our fate if Liat runs strictly on profit and loss. So, thanks for your intervention.
We all can take a leaf from Mr. Nassief’s writing and learn a few things. Whilst Mr. Nassief vehemently disagrees with the present management of LIAT and indeed singled out the Chairman of the board, PM Ralph Gonzalves of St. Vincent as the focus of his harsh criticisms of the regional airline this time around, he did not drag his arguments nor disagreement with LIAT to the gutter. He remained above the fray, made his arguments and allowed the chips to “fall where they may”.
Something for us to emulate in Dominica. Our disagreement with each other over often times silly things ought not to degenerate every time into a mostly partisan name calling, which colours our arguments depending on where we seat on the fence. Just thought I picked up a solid example of how we can disagree but not be disagreeable.
I have said it before, from the first letter Mr. Nassief wrote to LIAT; he would be probably the BEST person to transform LIAT’s operations.
EXCELLENT letter Sir!!
Well said sir,trust that ur letter will be taken with seriousness it should.
Job well done.
THEY HAVE NO IDEAS! Their minds and bellies are lazy and fat. Like Bob Marley said “dem belly full but dem hungry!” hungry for ideas and strategy, you cannot have a politician running an airline. Commonsense tells you that’s just bad business. That airline should declare bankruptcy, change its name, get new investors, put up the assets they have as collateral for new loans. Reinvest the money, get rid of the politicians in the midst of businessmen, set short/long-term service, and financial goals, and hold every employee accountable. Run the airline like a service business. Yet instead of seeing and decisively acting on the solutions to their problems they just like to stare the problems in the face while it grows bigger and bigger all the while drinking rum talking nonsense and acting big when dey small. Stop looking for other people to help allu, that’s a nasty habit Caribbean people have adopted and need to get rid of fast! Trinidad should be supplying subsidized fuel to LIAT, that fuel should be shipped to LIATs ports of entry even Dominica (at the moment planes cannot fuel in DA, this alone will allow them direct travel to and from the Islands because when they hopping around the Island it’s not just passengers they looking for… It’s FUEL for the plane too, so start there. Instead of just focusing on transporting people have a small fleet to transport heavy cargo, at least when allu lose my bags allu doh have to pay someone else to bring it to me. Get a couple helicopters and establish contracts with Caribbean governments (without private planes) and entertainment officials (traveling in the region) for private transport also offer short term rentals and leases to businesses offering Helicopter Island tours them to if it grows then offer public transport at affordable rates… I can go on all day… all I can tell you is UDOHREADYET!
Correction: planes can & do fuel , both at Melville Hall and Canefield. And if we wanted we could sell this fuel at low cost, sourced cheaply thru. Petro Caribe without putting the massive mark-up we are putting on our diesel supplies from the same source, for instance.
my boy you good too eh…….skerrit and his boys cyan roll on you with no talk doh…
they know what tree they barking up on.
if it was lennox linton, joshua francis or thompson fontaine who spoke these very exact words……Tony astaphan, simoen, lawrence brothers, kamala……all ah dem would have chew me up and tell de whole world who is my mother and how much time she went to de doctor, and how long i sit down at home looking for work
i like your position…..talk
everybody hearing you…..strangely no one is fighting back at you….truth be told
well said
Our energies should not be directed towards blaming leaders for failure but putting plans in place and negotiating resources for an international airport, that would be more sensible than expressing our dissatisfaction with leaders. While I support the profitability of the company I think we should show some respect for those who are trying. How much would be contributed by the business community towards greater access to the country and why not address that problem than the issue of management of the company.
Absolute nonsense. just because someone is trying does not afford them exemption from criticism. The points made on treating the airline as a business is valid and i dear say warranted. we have to be able to accepts constructive criticism if we are to succeed in any endeavor. Acceptance of failure should never be tolerated
Wouldn’t it be just great if a Nassief were controlling the reins of LIAT!? Afterall, they know best about everything.
Time to establish our own Nature Island shuttle service ONLY to Barbados as our gateway! Mr Gregor, you are my hero.
Mr Nassief,
I agree with your new vision for LIAT. I hope the management of LIAT pay attention to what you are saying and give it a chance.
“Stay home and mind baby.” LIAT is the best. LIAT is Dominica. One coin has two sides. I agree with Karam. All you too damn ungrateful!!!! All you flew LIAT to the bone; now all you want to drone it?
Grateful for getting stiffed every time we fly LIAT? grateful because we are paying good money through our noses for our tickets for a lousy service? I am Dominica but not a masochist, are you?
I am waiting for Argyle international airport to complete, to kick LIAT sooo far…
It cost me almost 400 us to fly to DA from sxm 1 hour flight I can flight to europe for 600 us a 9 hour flight I want to visit my land its so expensive liat is a rip OFF
I respect you Mr. Nassief
Mr. Nassief has presented a rather simplistic solution to a very complex issue. The issue here is not Liat but a reliable, affordable air transport system for the Caribbean. I’m no fan of Liat – goodness knows the level of poor service I have received from mainly their ground crew (I think their flight attendants are among the warmest, most welcoming anywhere)- but it can’t be as easy as what Mr. Nassief proposed. After all, if it were don’t you think it would have been done already in the more than 55 years the airline has been around.
Think for a minute of what’s being proposed here. If Liat were to follow the capitalistic recommendations, Liat would have to drop several routes, probably including Dominica. Over the past two weeks, I flew into and out of Dominica four times. The highest number of passengers to or from Dominica during these four trips was eight. ON one occasion there were two of us. If Liat were to operate strictly on a profit basis it would cut Dominica and several other routes. What, then, would happen? Do you really think that some other carrier would happily fly in to pick up the slack? What slack?
This is why Liat (or a Liat)has to operate as a social service. Yes, any such airline must be efficient but, I agree with Ralph Gonsalves that in monetary terms, it cannot be profitable. I believe all Caribbean governments ought to make a monetary contribution to the running or the airline which is the only one that connects the Caribbean and gives each destination a fighting chance with its tourism and allows the people of the Caribbean to move about. In the 55 years that Liat has been around, some 30 airlines have come and gone. Surely, some of these must have been owned and run by smart business people. And it’s not because of unfair competition from Liat because Liat’s fares are not lower, nor is its cost of doing business any lower. The powerful American pulled Eagle out, for heaven’s sake.
So, while Mr. Nassief is right to say we need Liat to provide good customer service and efficiently run, his formula, while it might result in a smaller airline, it will also be a meaner airline, and by meaner I mean it will have to cut off a lot of routes and reduce service to others. And where will that leave Dominicans? Stranded.
Instead, Liat (or a Liat), must be seen as a bridge. Something that connects the 22 countries to which it flies; an absolute necessity. NO one ever asks how profitable a bridge is. Everyone accepts that the bridge is essential, repairs it when it needs to be repaired and let it perform.
u all are ungrateful suckers, 55 years LIAT has been taking yu all home safely, but u want to kill Liat now Ungrateful suckers.
I am not sure you read correctly.
The letter’s point is not to kill LIAT, but to save LIAT.
The only way to save LIAT now is to change the board and the management which, for various uninteresting reasons, failed to succeed.
The need is now for a new team to restructure the company and start fresh. This CANNOT be done by the same people, with the same ideas and methodology .
The question is to save, not to kill…
Open your mind and read the letter again see what he is expressing before calling any one ungrateful because their are other ways that can help to keep LIAT in business so if the St.Vincent dont beleive that LIAT can be save he must step down because we cannot just be bailing out the aircraft always .
lol what you smoking?
IS that the best you can do?
Dominica has pumped money into Liat and its our tax paying money that went there – that gives us the right to complain and moan and stamp our foot – when after donkey years Liats service seems to be getting worst!
Are you trying to say that because someone has been in your life for 55 years, you ought to accept anything they do?
That all depends on your standards and expectations. More people are traveling abroad and can now compare the level of service in other regions with what they’ve been getting. In the interest of the smaller Caribbean Islands one airline should not have a monopoly on a service business that is growing.
Gregor please do not Jeapordise the admiration and respect I have for you. AS long as history has shown from 1960, anything any OECS Govt has had its hands on or in if u prefer is suseptible to theft voleh and pilferage. Do u know the amount of free rides staff and Govt Ministers take.? AS long as it is Govt controlled it was not designed to make profit. And the nail in the coffin was the jackass who took the decision with under the table payoffs to change the aircraft from to the present new ATRs. that nailed the coffin, to change what was not giving trouble, but simply to have upgraded to newer aircraft of the SAME type but no the jackasses went and changed aircraft to tief money backdoor under de table. they escalated their cost of ownership into suicidal proportions to move to aircrafts that ran American airlines Eagle bankrupt. and de asses decided to lease the same aircraft that took Eagle to its grave.
peter, you’re to emotional. mr nassief is correct as correct can be, how can governments continue to throw money into a failing company without even trying to reform that company to make it more efficient.. remember the monies from the tresuries of the islands does not belong to any government, its the peoples money..
LIAT needs serious management or let competition prevail.
MR NASSIEF, you are a fearless leader.. you always say it as you see it. RESPECT
Peter you never seize to amaze us with your vemin type approach, total lack of respect and amazing lack of constructive flow of a proper argument. If anyone is a jack, you sir have stolen all the resemblance of a classic jack. Simply amazing
Mr. Nassief makes some sense, however he sounds like one Allan Sanford when he was calling for competition Mr. Sanford at the time was promoting his airline Caribbean Sun, we all know what happened to that Airline, it still owes me money.
After having said all this Mr. Naseif admits that Dominica depends on LIAT for almost 80% of its airlift, yet he is in favor of fewer routes that would adversely affect Dominica. Does Mr. Nasseif have an airline or airlines in his back pocket or better yet does he have a plan to create one, that would to take up the slack left by liat.
Running an airline is not like running a taxi service it is a multi million $$ operation and the last time I checked airline companies were not rushing to service dominica.
How can you compare Me Nasseif to Allan Stanford??? Allan Stanford was a fraudster and a CROOK!! I agree with Mr Nasseif from the onset because if a Chairman of a Company or organisation has no confidence in its ability to be financially profitable then customers and investors and potential investors will lose confidence. Liat is a safe but very inefficient airline. Me Nasseif is a perfect candidate in my view to be the Chairman. (Although this is certainly not the motive behind his statement ). Liat needs to survive for our sake!
so are you recommending that the keep the status-co? what is your solution or alternate hypothesis to one presented
Mr.Nassief,that was an excellent letter. It definitely stated everything that needed to be said.
Please people look at the entire interview with Mr.Nassief on the televised program Time to Face the Facts.
http://vimeo.com/87513234
Excellent job.
What information do you have on other airline services. LIAT is no worse off than any other airline.
if i was gonsalves i would send u and fish by the bay u and your famaly including gonsalves told dominican we don’t need an international airport and gonsalves went and build his own if is me that is gonsalves i would give u the position shame
POOR MANAGEMENT, POOR LEADERSHIP, POOR BUSINESS, RESULT “NO PROFIT”.
If you are UNABLE to run a business, how do you run a Government?
I quite agree that LIAT needs to operate under a new dispensation. The governments should not be able to saddle it with taxes at their whims and fancies. The airline has to be independent and needs to know what its corporate tax rate is. Given the hugh losses to date the airline needs a tax break not stifled with taxes. The airline should be right-sized, re-branded and renamed from the stigmas – Leaving Airport Any Time, Luggage in Any Terminal; Ludicrous Insult to Aviation Technology etc…
Did Mr. Nassief promise you a job with his new airline?????? Just asking.
It is only wise that before a company goes for public offering an investor must make sure that the company has been producing steady profits and shows growth in the long term so you get return on investment. If a company is making losses it is normally sold at a cheap price. Our dear prime minister the dishonourable skeritt pumped 8 mil into liat without parliamentary approval and boast of his financial management skills. This is money lost. How long will we the people in the caribbean allow ourselves to be used by leaders who cannot tell the difference between a monkey and a snake to drag us down.
I agree with you mister astaphans. Its probably time to chop up liat and sell. Liat should have at least four jets flying into US markets a long time ago. They would be more profitable
Lmao my apology. NASSIF NOR ASTAPHANS.
LIAT,has been around for a while and the pilots are the best in the Caribbean, but management leave allot to be desired, it cost less on jet blue from L.A California to Porto Rico , and on liat it is three times that much from P.R. to Dominica and that is a shorter distance why is that? can some one help me out here?.
What is the cost of an airline ticket on Seaborne from Tortola to PR.
shorter the route the more expensive. please do some aviation studies.
I agree entirely. We have to stop thinking of LIAT as a social service and at the same time expect it to compete in a very tough, merciless commercial environment. That mix simply does not work. LIAT needs ruthless surgery in order for it to survive and become a happier company that we can praise instead of criticize.
Now the real story has been told, and we know our treasury is being drained in part by LIAT not being financially viable and sustainable. My question is, why do we shareholders continue to bailout an airline that could not pay both the lease on its aircraft as well as its payroll last month?
So we now know that $8m of taxpayers’ money went down the drain with no questions ask because it’s only people like Mr. Gregor Nassief who can publicly confront the those responsible for such mismanagement of the taxpayers purse. What’s next?
My hat is off to you Gregor
Llat is a disaster for the Caribbean Islands and Dominica in particular. we need a airline that is sustainable with a Chairman and board that can make it happen by their belief in its future. Since my first flight 7 years ago and the dismal treatment by staff and management I only used American Eagal and now Seaborne
Gregor, I agree with you 100%.
Politics and business is like trying to mix oil and water – it never works.
I have friends at Caribbean Airlines and again politics is causing the airline to drain big cash. The same was true of BWIA.
Just recently they swallowed Air Jamaica and up to now the employees still don’t know why. They were counting on Jamaicans supporting the airline. That has proven to be a flawed assumption. As far as the Jamaicans are concerned Trinis took what was theirs and they would rather fly AA, Delta or United.
Governments should get out of the business of running a buisiness, particularly the airline business.
Gregor, you could not have said this better. It is time for a shake up before the airline literally fall. It is on it’s dying bed as these new ATRs will finally kill the company. The numbers made no sense for me wither. DASH-8 model hold a few less passengers, almost similar range and fuel consumption for twice the lease amount. Hummm …
I wish Mr. Nassief would run for P.M. I would fly home to vote for him A.S.A.P.
now thats is change i would support!!!
i throught of it already, but after karl nassief i am afraid, karl advised skerrit to put agriculture down for tourism..
they might be the same
sorry not karl i meant ivor
This was very well written and has my full support.
I strongly support it because as said how come the chairman of the board has no confidence that Liat will be profitable yet he wants Bail out after Bail out something those Government themselves cannot Provide at this time, Look at Barbados they are the brink of going to the IMF St. Vincent is totally broke, Dominica don’t even ask because there’s no money. No wonder Prime Minister Anthony never gave St. Lucian tax dollars to Liat, Maybe he know’s something we don’t know.
Nassief raised several very valid points. I hope the LIAT shareholder are taking note.
A well written piece! I’m proud you’re Dominican Gregor Nassief.
Thank you Mr nassief atleast someone is bold enough to tell the chairman enough is enough. These politcians are all the same just talk and talk with nothing happening. To start with there are too many managers in Antigua running up and down doing nothing. A study done liat by air Lingus years ago was put in a report that it was top management heavy and nothing was done about it. They closed all their city offices which was their main cash flow, what a dumb decision. Donot talk about their employees at the airports, they just could not be bothered about customer service not even the phones they answer. I travelled to Dominica from St lucia and they need to change all of them in Dominica, no wonder the StLucia government refused to put any money in Liat. Donot know who is advising the management but the ATR’s they bought are giving problems left right and centre. Liat is making some money at the end of the day but with poor management, a set of pilots who are in control, cancellations every day, overnighting passengers in hotels the rest is history.
Easier said that done. This seems to be mere grand standing on the part of the young Mr. Nassief. LIAT needs to be fixed but an open letter to Prime Minister Gonsalves has no meaning except to inform us that Mr. Nassief too thinks that LIAT needs to be fixed. I belief Mr, Nassief would be more effective by using his social connections rather than this kind of open letter.But maybe there is an alternate reason for this public display.
His first letter to the CEO did work. He resigned or they got rid of him. Gonzales will comply. Its too embarrassing for him not to.
From Canada:
Until LIAT is run as a business , where passengers are treated as customers , I will use an alternate route to Dominica.
Happy to see the business community taking an visible active role
Mr Nassief I am in full agreement with you, would join me that we need a longer runway so your guest can get to their destinatiion. Pray tell me LIAT is always book according to. It’s reservations personnel ??
sometimes I feel LIAT is it’s worst enemy ,except they change their plans and policies it will be down hill. customers have so many complains and other issues that affect them daily and not even a simple customer service desk is not available on the airports,just the check in counter where overworked agents ,don’t have the time to deal with you.
five members of my family will travel to Dominica soon we wont be giving our money to Lait no way will not travel to Antigua there is other route just have to use the internet for alternative airline
Paris, St. Maarten, Dominica via WinAir or Humming Bird Air (call Jungle Bay for HBA schedule)!
If you want to travel from Europe to Dominica without using Liat, you can fly to Pueto Rico on any airline flying to there, then you can use Seaborne Airlines from there to Dominica. Also, from Europe to St. Maartin, then BVI Airways/Winair to Dominica
Very interesting proposal. However, I don’t know of any airline flying non-stop direct from continental Europe to Puerto Rico. You can use KLM/AirFrance or Iberia/British Airways but this entails min. 1 stop (most often JFK). Better to fly direct to St. Maarten (or Martinique/Guadeloupe) and connect there (from Martinique your only option would be the ferry, which does not operate every day between Dominica and the French islands). So your best option, for daily, shortest route connections, would be to use St. Maarten from Paris and/or Amsterdam.
PS. There is not direct scheduled service between Dominica and St. Lucia anymore, so for flights coming direct from the U.K. you are limited to either Antigua or Barbados for onward connections (Trinidad is not really an option, since there is no direct service between that island and Dominica either).