RI airlines 'have more work to do'

The Jakarta Post ,  Jakarta   |  Sat, 11/10/2007 5:28 PM

Irawaty Wardany, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

Visiting European Aviation Safety Agency (EASA) officials have asked Indonesian airlines and the government to improve the country's air transportation performance following a ban issued earlier this year.

The officials were in Indonesia from Monday to Friday for technical surveillance, oversight and verification of national airlines, after the European Commission (EC) decided in July to ban all Indonesian airlines from flying to the 27-nation bloc.

The ban was issued after a string of deadly crashes in Indonesia over the past few years, raising serious questions about the government's ability to provide adequate safety measures.

""They have met with four Indonesian airlines; Garuda Indonesia, Mandala, Premi Air and Air Fast, just now and they asked the four to make some improvements,"" director general of air transportation at the Transportation Ministry Budhi M. Suyitno told reporters Friday.

He added that the four airlines had all secured contracts to fly to the European Union region in the future.

Budhi said EU officials first asked the four airlines to pay more attention to the quality of their pilots.

""They asked them to identify the pilots who should be replaced and those who only need to undergo medical check-ups,"" the official said.

He said the EU officials also underlined the importance of implementing safety management systems in each of the airlines.

""Some of them are good, but some others need to be improved,"" he added.

Thirdly, Budhi said, the EASA officials also suggested the airlines improve quality assurance measures such as training programs for the pilots. ""This still needs careful attention,"" he said.

The fourth, he said, was a suggestion for the air transportation regulator.

""They asked us (government) to speed up the recruitment of additional key personnel, including flight operation inspectors,"" he said.

Generally, they had found an improvement, Budhi said. ""They said Indonesian airlines had been on the right track and they were happy to see that we are really taking seriously (the need) to meet higher standards,"" he said.

""But we did not make this improvement just to impress the European verification team, but merely for safety matters. We are responsible for assuring the public's safety and improving our services to the public,"" Budhi said.

He said that the team would give a complete recommendation Monday and that both the government and airlines would follow it up soon.

Separately, Transportation Minister Jusman Syafii Djamal said he expected the visiting EU team would have a positive impact on the nation's airlines, although the visit would not automatically remove the EC ban on Indonesian airlines.

The six-member team will present the results of their verification before a meeting of the EC on Nov. 19 in Brussels, Belgium.

""The director general of air transportation will be invited there to make a presentation on the improvements that we have made so far,"" Jusman said as quoted by detik.com news portal Friday.

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