Cabinet approves lease of planes for airbridge

Cabinet on Thursday approved the wet lease of two aircraft to augment service on the domestic airbridge — a move initiated by the Tobago House of Assembly. The “actual management process” of the additional service has been agreed on and is now to be put in place, THA Chief Secretary Orville London reported at Thursday afternoon’s post-Executive Council Meeting press briefing. With Cabinet approval now secured, it is expected that the new service could be implemented in a few weeks, London said. The two 64-seat aircraft from CIMBA Air in Denmark will provide 25,000 additional seats on the problem-ridden airbridge. The lease arrangement would be for six months in the first instance, he revealed, and would cost Government some $2 million monthly. The deal with CIMBA Air was negotiated through the brokerage firm, DRT Consulting of Holland, and the wet lease arrangement will be undertaken by BWIA.

Meanwhile, London reported that Cabinet had also given its approval for “negotiations to resume” between the Australian firm, INCAT and the Central Tenders Board on the provision of a fast ferry on the inter-island service. At the same time, the joint negotiating committee, on which Tobago is represented, is currently meeting to look at a “new proposal” for the lease of a fast ferry for a nine-month period. “And we would expect some news on that by early next week, I would hope,” London told journalists. He added that the Port Authority of Trinidad and Tobago had indicated that today was its deadline for “making public the news on a cargo vessel. Tenders were put out, and in fact the tenders were opened earlier this week, and we are hoping — at least they have indicated that by today they should be releasing information on the award of that tender,” he reported. “That (vessel) would be primarily for transporting cargo between Tobago and Trinidad.”