Poland’s Lot airline was supposed to be ending the year with a 52 million zlotys (€12.74 million) net profit.
Instead, the state-owned carrier has had to rush to the treasury ministry for a handout just to keep its aircraft flying through Christmas.
The aid request at the beginning of last week stunned the government, which owns 68 per cent of the airline, and a furious Mikolaj Budzanowski, treasury minister, called for the head of chief executive Marcin Pirog, blaming him for the debacle.
Mr Pirog, who had served just over two years – longer than the average for Lot chief executives in recent years – was removed by the board.
But a simple change at the top is unlikely to save Lot. The airline has asked for a billion zlotys in aid, and the full amount of help could come to 1.5 billion zlotys.
“This is an unbelievable sum,” says an aviation expert. “The airline only has revenues of about 3 billion zlotys.”
He says that without an immediate cash infusion, Lot will fail to pay its bills for fuel, airport fees and salaries.
“People knew it was bad, but no one had any idea things were this bad.”
– (Financial Times)