Kenya Airways Pilots To Strike From Saturday

Pilots at troubled national flag carrier, Kenya Airways intend to go on strike from Saturday to seek better working conditions regardless of a court order suspending the industrial action, their union disclosed Friday.

The airline, partly owned by the government as well as Dutch carrier KLM, is one of the continent’s biggest, connecting multiple nations within Africa to Europe and Asia, but it is currently facing turbulent times.

The Kenya Airlines Pilots Association (KALPA) stated that several meetings with the airline management had failed to resolve the pilots’ grievances.

“No Kenya Airways flight will depart Nairobi’s Jomo Kenyatta International Airport from 6:00 am (0300 GMT) on Saturday”, the union’s secretary general, Captain Murithi Nyaga said.

“Kenya Airways management’s actions have left us with no other option,” Nyaga added. He further said that a 14-day notice on the action had ended without a solution.

“We had hoped that the management of the airline would soften its stance and engage in negotiation on the issues raised.”

The pilots, who have had a particularly fraught relationship with management, are pressing for the reinstatement of contributions to a provident fund.

They also want back payment of all salaries halted during the Covid pandemic.

Kenya Airways on Wednesday warned the strike would jeopardise its recovery and said none of the grievances by the pilots merited a strike.