Financial Post 15-March-2010 Air Canada’s chief executive stepped up his attack on Persian Gulf airline Emirates Monday, characterizing his rival as a state-sponsored leech with too many planes that wants to suck passengers from other carriers.
In his latest assault on the United Arab Emirates’-based airline, Air Canada chief executive Calin Rovinescu said Emirates is aiming to win more access to Canada’s airports only because it wants to unload surplus capacity into the country.
“Emirates’ real aim is to dump its excess capacity resulting from too many wide-body aircraft commitments, including A-380s, into the Canadian market, just as it has elsewhere in the world,” Mr. Rovinescu said in a speech to a business audience at the Canadian Club of Montreal. “As a state-owned carrier with access to virtually unlimited capital, it would siphon passengers from other carriers who are making connections en route and connect them through its Dubai hub instead.”
Because airlines flying internationally from Canada rely on connecting passengers to fill their flights, the loss of these passengers would lead to cuts in service and eventually to the elimination of some direct service to European destinations from secondary hubs, Mr. Rovinescu said. He argued that would ultimately mean fewer choices for travellers, not more as Emirates argues.
Mr. Rovinescu said he has been “particularly exorcised” by Emirates actions because the UAE has linked the debate over greater bilateral access for Canadian and UAE-based carriers to Canada’s continued access to the Camp Mirage military logistics base there. “How’s that for no state involvement in their affairs?”
The UAE has increased pressure on Ottawa in recent weeks in its efforts to get additional landing rights for its commercial airlines Emirates and Etihas Airways, suggesting that the renewal of Canada’s lease on the Camp Mirage forward operating base could be in jeopardy when it comes up for renewal in June if those landing rights are not granted.
Air Canada and Emirates executives have been waging a war of words over the past week after Emirates asserted that more flights from Dubai to Canada would generate $480-million of economic activity and 2,800 new jobs. Mr. Rovinescu last week called those claims “the stuff of fairy tales.” That prompted Emirates’ senior vice-president of international affairs, Andrew Parker, to charge that Air Canada benefits from Canadian protectionism, which it argues hurts consumers.
In his speech, Mr. Rovinescu said the key to the growth of Montreal as an airline hub lies in channeling connecting traffic through the airport. “We think we can connect a lot more traffic through Montreal between the U.S. and Europe, and Middle East and Africa, he said.
nvanpraet@nationalpost.com
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