LIAT – No responsibility or accountability

Tue Sep 03, 2013

Editor: I write to question the judgement of our current shareholder prime ministers in the appointment of persons to the directorship of LIAT.

Decade after decade we have seen LIAT lose money and the advent of strikes, all of which may (from my personal knowledge) fairly be laid at the feet of management – AND the Board of Directors, because management gets its direction from that higher body.Or they should do so, anyway, otherwise the Board is dead weight.{{more}}

Contract negotiations across all levels at LIAT are drawn-out and antagonistic, but need not be so. The strikes that inevitably follow cost the airline much more than if negotiations had been settled, but that seems not to matter to management.

If research is done into LIAT’s past, it will be seen that the same problems plague the airline year after year, yet management and the Board continue doing the same things and expecting different results – one of the symptoms of insanity. What is happening to LIAT now is nothing new, and nothing will change. Board and management appear to have authority, but no responsibility, and definitely no accountability.

The prime ministers – representatives of the true shareholders, the taxpayers – should take this opportunity to clean house, to at least clear the Board of its cobwebs and move forward with people who know about aviation, who know about LIAT, who know about innovation and change.

After the “meltdown” of the last few weeks, which stranded people from the Dominican Republic to Guyana, if nothing is done to change the way LIAT is governed at the top, then the rest of the Caribbean may lay the blame for any future losses and catastrophes squarely upon all currentthree shareholder prime ministers.

If they do nothing now, after this fiasco, the prime ministers are avoiding their responsibilities to the rest of the eastern Caribbean, and deserve to be thrown out of office forthwith.

In closing, LIAT chairman Jean Holder resigned his position over two years ago – WHY IS HE STILL THERE?

James Lynch