Following a week-long protest by Kenya Airways pilots that resulted in scores of flights being cancelled and thousands of customers being left stranded, a Nairobi court has ordered the pilots to report back to work by Wednesday am.
The Jomo Kenyatta International Airport in Nairobi was the scene of the Kenya Airline Pilots Association (KALPA) strike on Saturday, defying a court ruling imposed last week prohibiting the industrial action.
On Tuesday, Justice Anna Mwaure ruled that “the Kenya Airways pilots must unconditionally resume their responsibilities as pilots by 6:00 am on November 9, 2022.”
The walkout has made matters worse for the struggling national carrier, which has been losing money for years despite receiving millions of euros from the government to keep it viable.
The court order, which came as the airline stated that the majority of its flights had been cancelled owing to the strike, received no immediate response from KALPA.
The airline said that KALPA had “exposed the airline to irreparable damage” in its announcement on Monday that it was cancelling its recognition of the union and withdrawing from their collective bargaining agreement.
The airline’s management was told by Mwaure to let the pilots “perform their responsibilities without harassing them or threatening them and especially by not taking any disciplinary action against any of them” before the court would now review the matter.
The largest airline in Africa, which connects several nations to Europe and Asia, is controlled in part by the government and Air France-KLM.
The airline reported on Sunday that 56 flights had been cancelled as a result of the strike, upsetting the plans of 12,000 passengers.
The 10% of the staff that are in protest want all salaries that were stopped during the Covid-19 outbreak as well as the return of provident fund contributions.
The carrier estimated losses at $2.5 million per day and warned that the strike would threaten its ability to recover.
