Is it COPE, choke or joke?
By Capt. Elmo Jayawardena-March 1, 2020, Elmojay1@gmail.com
By chance, I came across a YOUTUBE presentation of the current COPE committee interrogating the SriLankan Airlines’ (UL) new Board of Directors and its senior management. Interrogation is the right word as the Diyawanna Oya stalwarts were firing questions from all angles at the new board of UL and some others who accompanied them from various departments of the company. I know the airline is struggling to survive. Already, there have been competent committees appointed by Diyawanna Oya to do thorough investigations into the mal practices of its operations and to provide comprehensive reports that have been subsequently sent to the higher powers that be. I certainly do not know what action had been taken, but I sure know the stable doors were wide open for a long time and the horses and the asses may have long bolted away. I do not know enough to write about the sagas that have taken place in the sad decline of a once proud airline. So let me stick to what I saw with my own eyes on YOUTUBE, the ‘Gun Fight at OK Corral’ between COPE and UL.
"The jury passing on the prisoner’s life, may in the sworn 12 have a thief or two, guiltier than him they try", that is the Bard himself with his William wisdom telling us about those in the judgement business. Now, I am not saying the COPE boys are thieves, certainly not, I have no clue about what halos they wear and what harps they play. But I sure like to ask one simple question? As much as they are well educated people, do they really know anything about the complexities of airline management? Or are they firing salvos of unmitigated ammunition to shoot down the new board of UL whilst the ‘mother-lode’ that is missing is completely out of their RADAR screen?
Any case, why ask them? They were appointed just a couple of months ago and given a debt-ridden airline to turn around. They have almost impossible tasks to carry out now exacerbated with the added burden of countering the menace of Corona. If the COPE boys wanted facts, they should first read the Waliamuna Report and the PRECIFAC Report and the 1,400-page PCOI Report in order to get familiar with who were in Jester’s garbs performing in the circus when UL was losing billions? Well that is another story for the taxpayer to weep about.
Let’s talk a bit on buying aeroplanes and leasing aeroplanes, perhaps to give a simple idea to you, the reader. If you have money, you call Airbus or Boeing and tell them to send you a plane. That was good for countries that minted money such as Saudi Arabia, Qatar and Kuwait plus others of that gilded league. As for poor relations in aviation, like us, we had to lease. This is where the game gets interesting. There are so many aircraft leasing companies that operate internationally and they all have their modus operandi tailored to usually to milk the buyer. That is their gravy train. This is why an airline like ours needs a razor sharp, very well-versed team in leasing, to play marbles with the big boys, and come out without burning their fingers. Firstly, we need to find out what destinations we need to fly to. Then decide on what loads we hope to carry. Then comes the model of the aeroplane that can do the job for us, followed by its affordability. Then we look for the best possible leasing company to get the best financial deal to procure the plane. In addition, we need to look at exit clauses and extend clauses and a number of other details to validate our transaction. Of course, there is more meat to the matter which I do not have the luxury of space to write about. All this will work if the people who negotiate for the airline are as honest as the day that dawns. But, of course the ‘buts’ are there. Who eats plain bread when butter and jam is provided in the menu? If those in charge of leasing are incompetent or fraudulent, then the leasing business makes someone very rich whilst the airline gets mired in debt.
UL is in debt, deep debt. That is a very sad situation for Sri Lanka. How that cookie crumbled to bog down the airline in financial difficulties is linked directly to Diyawanna Oya. They were the high priests and they made all the decisions, and some placed their altar-boys in strategic places to collect the ‘sammadan’ in US dollars that found their way to coffers without labels. Now the same Diyawanna Oya, after appointing a new board, is sending the COPE boys to flex their muscles and vocal chords and talk on YOUTUBE meaningless maladies that further confuse the common man and common woman who are the denizens of Sri Lanka.
As the YOUTUBE show went on the UL team held their own professionally, without getting rattled by the machine gun fire that came from the COPE shooters. Watching this comedy, I was wondering whether there had been some mix-up in the seating arrangements of the two parties. Perhaps the COPE team was parked on the wrong side of the divide. The UL team should have changed sides and taken the reins of the inquisition and asked from COPE how Diyawanna Oya under all political colours completely overlooked the vandalising of the ‘cruise ship.’ The airline limped from one financial disaster to another with no solution in the horizon. The massive losses that built up under different managements were at most times orchestrated by the political godfathers who ruled the country and thought UL was their family inheritance. Such was the power, and such was the folly, where none stood as the judge and the jury to stem the colossal waste that Diyawanna Oya brought upon the airline.
Whether there a future for UL is a valid question in many a mind that feels for the airline and the country? From what little I know about the aeroplane world, there sure are many possibilities for SriLankan Airlines to rise as the Phoenix and fly the skies with pride. It has an excellent safety record which is a paramount qualification to an airline. The staff is experienced, well-trained and capable. The one negative factor has always been and will always be the political interference that comes from Diyawanna Oya. It encompasses policy and planning strategies, which had been a bane to whatever progress UL is capable of achieving. Now the company has got a new Board and it was mentioned by the Chairman that all of them were doing an honorary job to place the airline on the right rails. That is a laudable commitment, and I sure hope they will be left alone to resurrect the company.
COPE, that is the word, and I don’t even know what its functions are. Neither do I know what results it has achieved, maybe a pass mark in some matters they undertook. As for this aviation fairy tale that I witnessed on YOUTUBE bioscope, in my humble opinion, COPE has failed miserably. Their sheer arrogance amply displayed their ignorance of professional aviation matters and their scant disregard to seek the truth in a competent manner. The script of the story was COPE making meaningless accusations to bulldoze the UL Board and their team. They may have had their Donkey Serenades cheering for them, but anyone with common sense would know what COPE put up was nothing but a cheap ‘Gallery Show’ brandishing their power.
Even though reluctantly, we have to agree, that COPE stands on pedestals that give them the authority to ramrod the people before them. But the perennial question is whether they have the competency and the right.
