LAM Remains Perfectly Safe, Says Minister

20 April 2011

Maputo — The Mozambican government on Wednesday assured passengers that the national air company, Mozambique Airlines (LAM), is safe and that they can all continue to trust in its services.

Reacting at a Maputo press conference to Tuesday’s decision by the European Commission to ban all Mozambique certified companies from European airspace, Transport Minister Paulo Zucula said LAM is affected because of weaknesses detected in the Mozambique Civil Aviation Institute (IACM), which is the regulatory body for the sector.

There are 13 air companies certified in Mozambique. As the Tuesday statement from the Commission makes clear, all are banned from flying to Europe because of failings by the IACM to observe safety norms adopted by the International Civil Aviation Organisation (ICAO) .

An ICAO audit in January 2010 found gaps in the IACM’s capacity to comply with its responsibilities for supervising air safety. At the time of the audit, over 77 per cent of the ICAO norms were not effectively implemented in Mozambique, particularly with regard to the employment of qualified technical staff.

“LAM suffers the consequences, not because it has disregarded international rules, but because the national civil aviation authority has weaknesses”, said Zucula. “Mozambicans can trust in LAM and continue to fly on LAM”.

The restrictions introduced by the European Commission, he added, do not mean that the quality and safety of its air transport services have deteriorated.

“This ban does not mean that we have gotten worse – on the contrary, we’ve been getting better”, said Zucula. “It simply means that the Europeans have now detected shortcomings that we know about and have been working on since 2008”.

“LAM has always complied with the highest standards of the civil aviation industry”, he continued, “and has won praise from the international civil aviation authorities”. This was shown by the fact that the International Air Transport Association (IATA) had awarded LAM its key quality certificates.

Furthermore in 2008, LAM was chosen Best African Regional Airline by the African Airlines Association (AFRAA), and in 2009 LAM was appointed to the board of governors of IATA.

LAM has an excellent safety record. Zucula said it had recorded only three minor accidents in 20 years. Since its creation, in 1980, the company has not had a single fatal accident.

The ban does not directly affect LAM’s business, since it only flies one route to Europe, and the aircraft it uses is leased from a European company. LAM’s twice weekly Maputo-Lisbon flights are operated with a Boeing 767-300, leased from the Portuguese company Euro Atlantic, which is responsible for the plane, the crew and the maintenance.

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