THE management of Arik Air says it has disengaged 300 of its workers.
Adebanji Ola, Arik corporate affair manager said the decision was owing to the economic impact of COVID-19 which has affected the airline from carrying out its routine maintenance on its aircrafts and limited revenues against operational costs.
“Arising from the devastating impact of the COVID-19 pandemic, leading to the constrained ability of the airline to complete heavy maintenance activities and return its planes to operations, stunted revenues against increasing operational costs, the management of Arik Air (In Receivership) has declared 300 staff members redundant to its current level of operations.
“The leadership of the impacted unions have been contacted to negotiate a redundancy package for the affected staff”.
The airline noted that over 50 percentage of its workforce of over 1,600 staff have been on furlough in the past six months on a base allowance, adding that the decision to “let go off staff is naturally a difficult decision. Arik Air wishes the impacted staff well in their future endeavours.”
Consequently, the airline apologised to passengers whose travel plans were disrupted by the protest carried out by the National Union of Air Transport Employees (NUATE), yesterday.
The protesters reportedly disrupted operations in Lagos and prevented the airline from processing passengers at the Murtala Muhammed Airport Domestic Terminal 1 and 2.
