Turks May Help Macedonia Form National Airline

Ehemalige nationale Airline PalAir Macedonian

Turkish Airlines has indicated that it is willing to assist Macedonia set up its own national airline, following the demise of Macedonian Airlines several years ago, Balkan Insight reports.

Turkish Airlines' Senior Vice President for Marketing and Sales, Ziya Taşkent, has said the company is willing to consider a joint venture in Macedonia aimed at setting up a new national carrier.

MAT, Macedonian Airlines, the last government-backed national carrier, collapsed in 2009. Mat Airways, Macedonia’s last privately-backed national airline, folded in 2011. Taşkent said Turkish Airlines had already had similar experience in forming joint companies.

“There is no reason not to extent this model with other companies, if the two sides have a strong will to merge resources,” the daily Vest newspaper cited Taşkent as saying.

Earlier this month, the government launched a tendering procedure for a consultant to analyze the market and determine which established airline might be willing to assist its bid to set up a new carrier.

The government said the company would be offered a license to operate as Macedonia’s national carrier. At least 51 per cent of the capital would have to be Macedonian and at least one aircraft would have to be registered in the country.

The aviation specialist site Ex-Yu Aviation News has suggested that one of the lobbyists on behalf of Turkish Airlines is the Turkish-based airport management firm, TAV, which already runs Skopje and Ohrid airports in Macedonia.

In the absence of a national airline, the Macedonian Civil Aviation Agency in 2012 awarded Turkish Airlines the status of “regular carrier”. This gave it exclusive rights in its choice of destinations in addition to landing and handling fee exemptions at the country’s two civil airports in Skopje and Ohrid.

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