KARACHI: A designated safety audit team of the International Air Transport Association (IATA) is expected to visit Pakistan in the middle of September to assess the operational management and control systems of the Pakistan International Airlines (PIA).
The operational safety audit (IOSA) is carried out after every two years. The last such audit was carried out in 2018. The audit programme was designed by the IATA in 2003 to access the operational management and control systems of airlines.
According to the IATA, safely connecting people and business is its top priority as it works with airlines to raise standards and implement best practices.
Meanwhile, a pilots’ body urged Prime Minister Imran Khan to play his role in saving the PIA by replacing its incumbent management with those having knowledge of the aviation sector. It claimed that the national flag carrier had lost around Rs90 billion in just two months due to a ban imposed by the European Union Aviation Safety Agency (EASA).
The EU agency had suspended PIA’s authorisation to operate to EU member states for a period of six months from July 1 due to the aviation minister’s statement that more than 260 pilots had fake or dubious licences.
A spokesman for the Pakistan Airline Pilots Association (Palpa) said that taking advantage of the EASA’s six-month ban, foreign airlines had expanded their operations to major cities in Pakistan to capitalise the market share. “It is feared that the time is not far away when most of the local routes will be eaten up by other airlines, triggered by the poor policy of PIA management,” he warned.
He said the British Airways announced that it would start operating flights from Heathrow to Islamabad from September, two months earlier than its scheduled plan.
“If foreign airlines start taking more business by offering their services to a large number of passengers then identity of the PIA would be lost,” the spokesman feared.
