Biman Chairman Muyeed sees no ‘logic’ to splitting airline in two

The national carrier has proper ground handling capacity, Chairman Abdul Muyeed Chowdhury says

Abdul Muyeed Chowdhury, chairman of Biman Bangladesh Airlines, does not see any “logic” to the proposal to split the airlines into two parts as suggested by the government’s taskforce on economic strategy reform.

He made the remarks while speaking to the media at the Kurmitola Biman Hanger on Thursday.

Labelling Biman Bangladesh Airlines as an “inefficient” organisation, Planning Advisor Wahiduddin Mahmud indicated that proposals to bring in foreign management or entities to manage the state-owned airline to turn it commercially profitable were now under consideration.

At a press conference held at the National Economic Council, or NEC, conference room in Dhaka’s Sher-e-Bangla Nagar on Monday, the task force suggested splitting Biman into two divisions—one of which would be managed by a foreign company.

When asked if the proposal to split Biman into two divisions was logical, Muyeed Chowdhury said: “I believe that there’s no logic behind it. First of all, Biman has no problem. Biman tickets are now available online. Earlier, Biman agents engaged in some wrong deeds regarding ticket sales. Those incidents reported in the media now aren’t things we were involved in. The tickets are for other airlines. They sell it in bulk. Then the agents release them slowly at a higher cost. Our tickets are not sold in that way.”

The reporters asked the chairman what measures had been taken to reform the airlines.

“Today we performed the C-check under our own management, which was never done before. This couldn’t be possible without everyone at Biman working together. It saved millions for us. How could it be possible if Biman wasn’t working well?” he said in reply.

When asked about Biman’s ground handling capacity, the chairman said the airline had been working on it since the start.

“If someone comes from abroad, will they bring a workforce from the US? They’ll use our staff. Then why can’t we run it with our people?”

“Of course, it will be different if someone from outside comes and says they will bring workers from Dubai or India.”

Muyeed denied that foreign airlines had complaints regarding the service. “Foreign airlines aren’t complaining at all. They don’t face any trouble. These issues are raised for no reason. There are some tactical problems with luggage handling. We can’t take more than three containers to the current terminal. After reaching the terminal, the containers need to be driven backwards. It causes a problem when there is too much luggage.”

“The first batch of luggage arrives by the time passengers complete their immigration formalities. We’ve improved a lot. Previously there used to be some problems with luggage. We can’t deny that. Now everyone has cameras on them. They’re monitored all the time. There’s no more scope [for misdeeds].”

He said that if any wrongdoer was found, they would lose their job immediately.

The chairman also said that more planes were expected to land at the airport and they were hiring more staff members to meet the demand.

When asked if Biman could provide C-check service to foreign airlines, Myeed said Biman was capable. “We’ll provide service to the aircraft from foreign countries. People will have their trust in us strengthened after we provide such services,” he said.