Kenya Airways to cut upto 600 jobs

Bloomberg

Kenya Airways, the east African country’s struggling national airline, is to cut up to 600 jobs as part of a bid to achieve $200 million in savings, the airline.
The reductions at the airline, partly owned by the government as well as Air France KLM, could see around 15 percent of the 4,000-strong workforce cut.
As part of efforts to improve profitability and “seek a long term sustainable financial structure”, the airline said it had been forced to take “hard decisions on the aircraft we fly as well as making substantial changes on other aspects of our business.”
Kenya Airways, which uses the slogan “The Pride of Africa”, is one of the continent’s biggest carriers, and a key airline connecting multiple nations within Africa to Europe and Asia.
“We will embark on a restructuring process that will result in approximately 600 members of staff being declared redundant or redeployed elsewhere,” the statement said, adding that the cuts will begin in May.
Kenya has seen international tourist numbers dented in recent years, with some visitors scared off after attacks by the Somali-led and Al-Qaeda-linked Shebab insurgents.
Kenya Airways Ltd., more commonly known as Kenya Airways, is the flag carrier of Kenya.
The company was founded in 1977, after the dissolution of East African Airways. The carrier’s head office is located in Embakasi, Nairobi, with its hub at Jomo Kenyatta International Airport.

The airline was wholly owned by the Government of Kenya until April 1995, and it was privatised in 1996, becoming the first African flag carrier to successfully do so. Kenya Airways is currently a public-private partnership. The largest shareholder is the Government of Kenya (29.8. percent), followed by KLM, which has a 26.73 percent stake in the company. The rest of the shares are held by private owners; shares are traded on the Nairobi Stock Exchange, the Dar es Salaam Stock Exchange, and the Uganda Securities Exchange.
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