KUWAIT CITY - Kuwait`s Aviation Lease and Finance Company (ALAFCO) on Sunday played down the cancellation of a multi-billion-dollar deal to sell 19 aircraft to Kuwait Airways Corp. (KAC).
"We have received requests from 18 local and foreign companies to lease our planes following the cancellation of the deal," the official KUNA news agency quoted ALAFCO chairman Ahmad al-Zabin as saying.
In June the two companies signed a Memorandum of Understanding under which KAC would buy 12 Boeing and seven Airbus aircraft for an estimated three billion dollars.
The deal was part of a major project by the state-owned KAC to modernise its ageing fleet of 15 Airbuses and two Boeings.
Its cancellation came after parliament and the Kuwaiti government agreed in early July to debate a bill that would transform the loss-making KAC into a shareholding public company operating on commercial basis.
However the debate was delayed until the next parliamentary term which opens on October 30, despite what appears to be overwhelming support for the plan that would see more than 70 percent of KAC stocks sold to citizens.
KAC, which has incurred more than two billions dollars in losses during the past 17 years, has repeatedly come under fire from parliamentarians who have charged the corporation of squandering public funds.
In July lawmakers approved recommendations by a three-MP committee of inquiry which called for top KAC executives to be referred to the public prosecutor over alleged financial and administrative irregularities.
Launched in 2000, ALAFCO currently owns 18 aircraft. Over the past 16 months it has placed orders for 66 Boeings and Airbuses as part of a plan to increase its fleet to more than 80 planes.
09/02/2007 12:53 GMT