Financial Gazette (Harare)
Shame Makoshori
12 September 2007
Harare — NATIONAL airline Air Zimbabwe has been denied the right to pass through Indian airspace on its flights to Far Eastern destinations because the Parliament of Zimbabwe has not ratified an international air transport agreement signed with the International Civil Aviation Organisation (ICAO), The Financial Gazette heard last week.
India has ratified the agreement, which was signed in Chicago on December 7 1944.
The African Aviation Commission, which regulates air transport services on the continent, was created at a constitutional conference convened by the ICAO in 1964.
Transport and Communications Minister Chris Mushohwe last week pleaded with members of the House of Assembly to approve the agreement in order to allow the airline to fly over the Asian economic giant.
"The national airline needs to access the Far East by flying over India," Mushohwe told the House of Assembly shortly before the presentation of the $37.1 trillion supplementary budget to the House on Thursday.
"But it has been denied the right to fly over India because Zimbabwe has not approved the international air transport agreement adopted by the ICAO in 1944. It has become necessary for the House to approve the agreement. I recommend that it is approved," he told the House.
India, together with Singapore, Malaysia, Vietnam and China, are some of the countries Zimbabwe had recently strengthened political and economic ties with after the west slammed its doors on the country following a political standoff over the way Zimbabwe's controversial land reforms had been implemented.
Zimbabwe's exports to China alone totalled $4.2 trillion in 2006, up from about $3.5 trillion in 2005, while imports ended the year at $4.6 trillion.
Chinese companies such as the China Aerotechnology Import and Export Company (CATIC) have a strong presence in Zimbabwe where it has supplied electrical equipment, passenger planes and agricultural equipment.
As a result of the increasing demand for air traffic into that region, Air Zimbabwe had followed up by opening new routes.
Environment and Tourism Minister, Francis Nhema, has said after a slow start, there had been an upsurge in passenger numbers -- of up to 100 percent on some flights -- in recent months.
The airline had been flying into Beijing, China via Singapore since 2004.
But Mushohwe said there were plans by Air Zimbabwe to link the Far East through India.
However, amid fierce resistance from Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) legislators who argued that debate on the matter be deferred to another time because they had not been given the chance to look at the agreement, acting Speaker of the House of Assembly, Kumbirai Kangai asked for a vote.
There were more "yes" votes than the "no" vote leading to the ratification of the agreement.
"We have not been given the paper that we are debating. Why do you want to force matters on us?" asked Muvisi Zvizwai, an MDC member of the House of Assembly.
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