Against the background of claims made by members of the National Air Transport Association (NATA) that the recently renamed Eugene F Correia Airport continued to be dominated by a single company through rigid control of the Board of Ogle Airport Inc (OAI), Public Infrastructure Minister David Patterson used his presentation at the renaming ceremony to underscore the fact that the facility remains a state asset.
In the weeks preceding the renaming of the airport a verbal battle waged continually linked to claims made by NATA that the Ogle facility was in effect being controlled by Trans Guyana Airways CEO and OAI Board Chairman Michael Correia.
In his presentation at the renaming ceremony Correia had referred to “the privatization of Ogle,” which he said had been “the subject of public hearings, and the lease agreement negotiated by aviation experts, hired by the IDB, working on behalf of the government.” Seeking perhaps to allay expressed concerns amongst the majority of the operators at Ogle that the permanent association of the name Correia with the airport might give rise to what Roraima Airways boss Gerry Gouveia described as “further pretensions to proprietorship,” Patterson said that while he acknowledged that OAI is “a private company” it is managing “a government asset,” and, “as such, its management should be dealt with in an equitable manner.”
Gouveia who had told Stabroek Business earlier this week that he had read the minister’s presentation said he believed the minister had, “not accidentally, gone out of his way to make the point that notions of sole proprietorship are unacceptable.” Gouveia said he believed that implicit in what the minister had to say was the recognition that there were problems at Ogle.
“There was a specific recognition on the part of the minister that there are problems at Ogle and what he said, in his words, was that government will work with all stakeholders – not one but all stakeholders – to ensure that a satisfactory consensus is reached.”
Significantly, Patterson’s presentation at the renaming ceremony addressed a number of the issues that had been raised by the Aircraft Owners Association of Guyana (AOAG) over several years including measures to reduce accidents, enhanced compliance with International Civil Aviation Organisation (ICAO) regulations, improving oversight capabilities, aviation security capacity and upgrading the country’s air navigation service through the implementation of aeronautical surveillance service. Additionally, Patterson said, a draft Aircraft Accident and Incident Investigation Act has been circulated to stakeholders for comment.
Over the years members of the AOAG have persistently questioned the capacity of the state-run civil aviation resources to competently handle accident investigation and search and rescue operations. “It may well be that out of this situation has come some indication that change will come, both as far as the creation of an improved management culture at Ogle is concerned as well as in terms of fixing some of the longstanding problems in the sector,” Gouveia said.
