Kenya’s National carrier KQ is in a big crisis as statistics indicate it has lost more than half of its passengers in the past six months that ended June 2020.
The national carrier said Friday that the passenger numbers dropped by 55.5% to 1.1 million in contrast with 2.4 million over the same period last year, significantly squeezing revenues.
Attributing its massive loss of revenue and passengers to Covid-19 pandemic, the airliner said the accrued net loss for the six months ended June 2020 has widened by 67.3% to Sh14.33 billion.
The airline said it is currently facing reduced demand in passenger business and increased costs due to tighter health and safety measures.
KQ chairman Michael Joseph said, “Operations were severely impacted by the Covid-19 crisis resulting in depressed half year results.”
“The network activity from April to June was minimal due to travel restrictions and lockdowns effectively reducing operations to almost nil in connecting our home market to key cities,” the KQ chairman said Friday.
According to Joseph the 2020 results will be significantly negatively impacted because of the projected suppressed air travel demand. “We project the demand to remain at less than 50 percent of 2019 for the rest of the year,” said Mr Joseph.
Domestic and international flights returned in July and August respectively but KQ’s outlook for the remainder of the year remains depressed.
The airline chairman observed that KQ’s focus is now on cash preservation to help navigate through the difficult period that has seen global airlines run into massive losses.
