Yousry Abdel Wahab, head of the Private Aviation Association, called upon the chairperson of the Egyptian Competition Authority (ECA), Mona El-Garf, to intervene for the protection of private airline companies, which have been suffering major losses due to the absence of equality with state-owned airlines.
Abdel Wahab said that private airlines have lost 40% of the passenger traffic on their flights over the past year due to the decline of tourism, although there are signs of improvement in the tourist inflow to Egypt.
He said that the growth of traffic on public airliners and foreign private companies will be large compared to last year.
Furthermore, he argued for allowing private companies to fly to Arab and European destinations, especially as the civil aviation authorities of these countries agreed; however, the approval of the Egyptian Ministry of Civil Aviation is still pending.
He said that private airlines pay maintenance and ground service fees in dollars, even though they are Egyptian companies.
He noted that all fuel fees are also paid in full.
He explained that private aviation can achieve growth in the number of tourists coming to Egypt, whether from the Arab region or Europe.
There are 14 private airline companies in Egypt, including seven companies operating fleets with 39 airlines.
