The Kenyan national airline Kenya Airways has decided to address the shortage of pilots for its scheduled flights, recruiting forty pilots, local and foreign fixed-term to cover all routes, including the one that most interests tourists and Italian residents in Kenya and also Kenyans who want to visit our country for vacation or business, or the direct Rome-Nairobi.
Lately the company has provided its customers with a service not always satisfactory, canceling some flights and re-protecting those who had booked the direct between the two Italian and Kenyan capitals on Geneva, Paris or even worse Amsterdam, with considerable delays and, from Italy, the impossibility of taking the direct connection from Nairobi to Malindi, arriving on the same day as provided for in the agreement with the subsidiary for domestic flights Jambojet. Flight and coincidence that the Italian Embassy in Kenya, some tourism entrepreneurs from Malindi and Watamu and us from malindikenya.net spent our time with meetings, appeals and letters and that we had finally seen come true.
Kenya Airways, according to the national newspaper The Standard, has delayed these futures contracts because of a dispute with the pilots' union that opposed the hiring of foreign staff. However, the company explained that the requirements to be hired include a minimum of six years of experience as international airline pilots and obviously there are not so many local pilots "out and about" or accepting fixed-term contracts.
"Our goal is clearly not to exclude Kenyan pilots, as the contract pilots will only be serving the airline for two years after which they will be replaced by Kenyan pilots who have the necessary requirements," confirmed the airline in a statement.
All this happens on the eve of the high season, with already many bookings by Italian tourists for Rome-Nairobi but also by other European citizens who take advantage of this flight to connect to Fiumicino from other capitals to land in Nairobi.