The Blue Bird

We are living in the Gulf in a state of “tension without all-out war,” characterized by rising prices of goods and services, fluctuations in travel activity, and pressure on financial and investment markets. The question is: how long will this last?

With a decree that transformed Kuwait Airways into a wholly state-owned joint-stock company, it has joined many other enterprises under the umbrella of the Public Authority for Investment, alongside Kuwait Petroleum Corporation.

This is an initial step toward autonomy and the beginning of rescuing the “Blue Bird” from decline in the highly competitive civil aviation market. It is important here to recall some of the institution’s unstable history over the past more than 40 years. Its direct losses from the Iraqi invasion amounted to approximately $1.6 billion, with a similar sum required for its reconstruction, in addition to financial losses between 1990 and 1999 exceeding $100 million.

Placing the institution on the track of competition and commercial operation requires many decisive measures to ensure that the decree-law is effective in practice. The first of these is separating ownership from management, setting measurable objectives for the institution, including profitability, customer satisfaction, and adherence to schedules, as well as increasing the company’s market share, which entails transforming Kuwait into a major transit hub in the Gulf region.

The decree-law requires restructuring the company to ensure that its plans are implemented in accordance with its commercial interests first, as is the case with our competing airlines in the region.

Any airline in the world must have a vision and a clear definition, rather than serving merely as a passenger carrier. Regarding Kuwait Airways, it must be determined whether it aims to support Kuwait’s plan to become a financial and commercial center, or to support planned tourism activities. Both objectives remain distant so far, particularly given the unstable conditions in the Gulf region.