KAA should plough back revenue for JKIA repairs

Over the past few months, a series of power outages have hit the Jomo Kenyatta International Airport (JKIA) leading to the diversion of flights to nearby airports thus denting the airport’s image.

The blackouts showed the public the lack of proper planning at the airport, which is also East Africa’s most important aviation gateway and how disruptive it can be.

The national carrier, Kenya Airways and other airlines that operate from the airport always suffer financial setbacks when such blackouts because they have to fork out money to cater for hotel accommodation of affected passengers and arrange for connecting flights.

These are the sad statistics that were missing when Kenya Airports Authority (KAA) Managing Director Stephen Gichuki recently released a financial report to the media, which showed that revenue collection has increased at the airport by about 26 per cent in the past three years.

The KAA figures indicate that revenue at the facility has shot up from Sh5 billion in 2009/2010 to Sh6 billion in the 2010/2011 financial year. The figures are pegged on a July-to-July financial year basis.

The glossy figures have been attributed to 30 per cent increase in passenger numbers at the airport. This means more planes are landing at the airport, leading to the increase of aeronautical revenue, which comes from aircrafts’ navigation, landing and parking fees.

Distanced itself

This, coupled with the fact that the airport is being expanded is good news to the Kenyan economy.

But the recent power outages and the manner in which they were handled also highlights how tough the challenges to bring the airport up to the standards required will be, as they involve not only a facelift for airport facilities, but also a change of mindset among personnel.

It was not lost to the discerning public that after the recent power outages at JKIA, the Kenya Power Company Ltd (KP) distanced itself from the reports and clarified that it was not responsible.

It issued a statement saying that the KAA owns and operates the electrical power network inside the airport.

While it is not our duty to police whoever is responsible for power at the airports, we find it curious that those charged with the responsibility can come out and shift blame or deny responsibility all together.

There should be any form of ambiguity about who actually operates power inside the airports. Again, before shifting or denying responsibility one should first think about the many stranded passengers-the true victims of such incidents who are sometimes left waiting in the dark without knowing anything because no airport staff bothered to say anything.

If indeed it is the duty of the KAA to ensure availability of power at the airport, we hope the management will take up the duty and find a permanent solution to the frequent power outages with the same zeal it displayed while announcing figures of improved revenues at the airport.

It behoves the authority’s management to cultivate a service mindset among its employees to enable them improve the quality of service at the airport by thinking from passengers’ perspective rather than the administrative mindset that they currently have.

This is the only way to position JKIA for further growth and ensure that it does not lag behind its regional peers in terms of service quality, management efficiency and international competitiveness.

Plane traffic

It is good to know the management team has set the objective of transforming the airport into one of the best airports in the continent and that it is a key pillar of Vision 2030.

However, before spending huge amounts on new facilities, what KAA should do first is get rid of the typical civil servant mindset and see service quality and passenger satisfaction as an important part of its overall service value chain for the country.

This is the only way KAA can help the country and ensure sustainability of the high passenger and plane traffic that has been witnessed at the airport in recent times.