SriLankan Airlines, the National Carrier placed orders for twelve aircraft with Airbus Industrie of which two A 330 planes have been delivered. Colombo Telegraph can reveal that one A 330 yet to be delivered from Toulouse, France is to be fitted in the fashion of USA’s Air Force 1 made to measure for the use of former President Mahinda Rajapaksa.
SriLankan Airlines placed orders for 12 air craft with Airbus Industrie consisting of six A 330 and six A 350 in a major re fleeting exercise, one of which was to be fitted in a tailor made fashion for former President Mahinda Rajapaksa’s use. The A330 was to be fitted like the Air Force 1 used by the President of USA costing millions of dollars. The fitting necessitates gear to be fitted permanently to the front end of the aircraft which would add at least one tonne in weight even when other interior fittings are taken off when in use for commercial transport. The added weight would inflate the cost per flown mile in addition to lesser yields for the troubled airline.
Colombo Telegraph understands that once delivered for use the down time for fitting is three working days and another three days for dismantling after each journey which would render the aircraft to be grounded for six days. The cost of fitting this aircraft in this fashion has been spread over the purchase price of all twelve airbus craft to avoid scrutiny.
The Chairman of SriLankan Airlines during the tenure of President Mahinda Rajapaksa was his brother in law Nishantha Wickremasinghe, who has since resigned from this post. The CEO of the troubled airline too resigned after President Mahinda Rajapaksa lost in a bid to seek re election for an unprecedented third term. To the surprise of many the Chief Operating Officer of SriLankan Airlines has remained in his position to date.
Colombo Telegraph reliably understands that a new Board of Directors, yet to be named would be going into the balance purchases of these aircraft in the coming week.
Web / January 12, 2015
Unbelievable! Are we far more superior than other countries on earth. Thank god to kick this MR the Hitler out.
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Amarasiri / January 12, 2015
Web
“Unbelievable! Are we far more superior than other countries on earth. Thank god to kick this MR the Hitler out.”
Story of the modern Hitler…
https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=IKHJG5ztL68
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Javi. / January 12, 2015
Web,
“Patriotism is your conviction that this country is superior to all others, merely because you were born in it”.
Patriotism is to politics what faith is to religion: The unquestioned acceptance of information that is either unverified or that may actually be in conflict with factual evidence. Patriotism is the incubator of wars.
That is how the Shit Buckets Satayakas and Seuvras played the masses and still do. i
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Puhul Dosi / January 12, 2015
Ahhh the delusions of utter grandeur we Lankans have to put up with……
Any way of cancelling the order and clawing back the penalty from that scoundrel Nishantha and those who authorised this white elephant?
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BBS Rep / January 12, 2015
We made him king. He assumed he was king. The king can do anything and needs the best of the best.
It was not his fault. Hero worshipping scoundrels besides worshipping every dirty feet in slippers and trouser Johnnies has been the bane of the Sri Lankan citizen.
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Javi. / January 12, 2015
“” It was not his fault.”
Just water water and they got shot like mice.
How can beggars be choosers when there was a vicious tiger on the prowl.
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bo / January 12, 2015
Over the top. Vajra carrying fake incompoupe’s delusion of grandeur. His followers are stupid, so this conman is playing on their stupidity.
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Palmsquirrell / January 12, 2015
I agree with you BBS Rep.
Mahinda was able to get away with soo much in part because the Nationalis Sinhala Buddhist gave him a blank check.
Even this election Mahinda got more Sinhala votes than Maithiri, this despite everyone knowing how much he was robbing the country and had turned the country into a family feifdom where no one was allowed to question the Rajapaksa. He got soo many votes because most Sinhala Buddists were concerned Sinhala domination over Tamils would suffer if Mahinda lost.
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Javi. / January 12, 2015
Socialist France therefore never investigated the terror killing by Sri Lankan state- Hello DJ and Mango commentators.
Socialist France delivers similar docking devices to Russia.
Socialist France behaves exactly like Russia when they go after Islamic terrorist of cells- shoot to kill no questions asked as long as you don’t attack within france.
7/7 UK was planned at France and executed – known to the socialist newspapers of france 2 years before 9/11
North Africa and France when will you stop the war that is emptying all pockets.
However, no matter what excuse politicians dream up for waging war, the underlying cause of all wars is economic in nature.
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Malaka / January 12, 2015
COO never leave, he is a player balance both sides, Royalist knows how to balance the both, He will not get the same wages when he leaves, Brother still large resting at home after the golden Key fraud, father used to be a Senior Advisor to the Gothbaya now passed away.. so he will survive. This Captain is a real player who knows how to balance to get paid $$$$$$ . his current wages are $ usd 10,000 per month from this Loss making Airline.
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Laxman / January 12, 2015
The only way this troubled Airline could be saved would be for the Government to appoint suitably qualified people to the Board (not political lackeys)and employ equally qualified persons to Senior executive positions.Most of the current Senior positions are being held by incompetent persons whose only strength has been their allegiance to former Chairman/CEO
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Laxman / January 12, 2015
The only way this Airline could be saved is for the new Government to appoint a suitably qualified(not politically)Chairman/Board and to ensure equally qualified persons are engaged at Senior Executive positions. Most of current Senior positions are being held by people whose only strength has been their undivided allegiance to former Chairman and CEO.
There appear to be more passengers inside the Airline than on Board
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Sadith / January 12, 2015
This is a fine example of the “mean journalism” twisting the facts to satisfy the malicious agenda. First of all this was revealed by the Sunday Times paper in October 2014. Secondly, Air bus industry do offer VIP conversion kit for its A330 series and It’s nowhere close to Air force 1, it is a joke if anybody say these two has similar features. This conversation kit is popular among many airlines and about a year ago Bangkok Air paid $ 6 million for a similar kit.
According to Air bus specifications this kit can be installed and removed easily and no 1000km permanent fixtures necessary.
Whether Sri Lankan Airlines need this luxury or not is totally up for debate, but the information given by this writer is completely falsehood and misleading the readers, and try to portrait that this is one of a kind in the world.
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perera / January 13, 2015
THANK YOU FOR THAT INFO. WILL DO SOME RESERCH AND EXPOSE THE AUTHOR OF THIS ARTICLE. SADLY CT DOES NOT CREDIT THE ARTICLE SO IT HAS TO BE FOR MYSELF.
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Sumith Bandaranayke / January 12, 2015
We believe a strong direction should be taken to SriLankan in order to shine it as the national airline of the country, and most importantly as the airline carrying the president of Sri Lanka. The positions from Chairman to CEO to COO are politically appointed. These designations need to be carefully looked at. Chairman is the brother of previous president, and CEO was called from Australia to take ownership plus Chief Operations Office (COO) is a Captain who is appointed by CEO since he’s the official pilot of the past president. A chairman who is not OL qualified and a airline pilot as a COO who has also done OL was running this airline.
The COO is former son of Army Commander Denis Perera and why he was appointed as the COO of SriLankan is to be the official pilot of the past president so he can relax his brother Kavan Perera who was the main stakeholder of Golden Key Money Scam. Other than that he does not posses any educational qualifications other than OL from Australia.
Sincerely you will not need any of these gents if you want to run a successful airline operation.
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dcn / January 12, 2015
MR and his clan has treated this country as their little kingdom. Whilst robbing on every possible transaction they also were misusing the country’s resources.
Airlanka running at a terrible loss since the Emirates shares were acquired by this government and their management withdrawn. This is in addition to Mihin Airways which is loading the common man with additional losses. All these cronies who were part and partial of this regime must be taken to task even if they escape to their second home in Australia, USA, UK, CANADA, etc They should be brought back to face the trial and also include their families.
The public has a right to know the truth and the responsibility lies on the Maithree/Ranil government to expose all details and punish them according to the law.
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Diogenes / January 12, 2015
Presumably these air buses were ordered to ease the day to day transport difficulties of the people, because the bus service alone would not be satisfactory..I can imagine patriotic women folk of Hambantota – or better to be renamed Humbugtota – flying up and down in them to do their marketing! Miracle of Asia!
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Senthil / January 12, 2015
For any luxury vehicles the parts and service and maintenance cost is much more than initial cost. Specially air planes, we can not ignore safety. So it is going to cost more to the new government, we can not cancel the order either – so the poor Vedas who voted to elect MR have to pay the bill. So only option is to freeze all the foreign assets of all MR & CO. New government can use Interpol like they have used Interpol to bring back fake tigers. Hope the ordinary voters will be very careful at the next general election – start educating them from now onwards.
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DJ / January 13, 2015
UL has a VVIP kit already in the hanger which cost the company 4 million dollars, the new one will be more. MR does not believe in sacrifice for the cash strapped country and Airline. The people hv done right in electing a new President
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TL / January 13, 2015
The CEO and chairman resigned ? is it OK ? have to change all executives and director board too. and Mr Harry Jayawaradana will be the chairman of SriLankan Airlines and UL need to be a profitable airlines. with international quality.. UL need some kind of new A/C but last gov said 12 A/C brand new but it is not true … replace 4 A340 Aircrafts for A350.. anyway we hope A friendliest smile in the sky…
P.S Mr Kaplia ( former CEO) he was not only CEO of UL he was 5 company’s CEO including Mobitel… if #MY3 palanayak don’t give CEO seat for businessman….
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Laxman / January 15, 2015
Harry Jayawardena as the Chairman ?You must be joking for one only has to go back in time to check how he managed Air Lanka when he was the Chairman.He would be better off minding his own private Business
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vis8 / January 13, 2015
Please research before you “write” in haste (to join the fray)… A lot of incorrect statements here. Hope this is not the real my3 ‘yugaya’ where a lot of pseudo-experts in multitude of subjects are trying to ‘air’ their ‘opinions’.
… Colombo Telegraph is becoming a haven for pseudo-journalists.
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Thanga / January 14, 2015
There was a picture in the newspapers showing Basil Rajapaksa and his wife leaving the airport with luggage. How did Basil Rajapaksa managed to leave the country despite a pledge by president Sirisena before the elections saying no bigwigs of the former government will not be allowed to leave the country? Basil Rajapaksa after enjoying life as a Minister for 9 years flew out of the country when his brother is in deep trouble.
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Tamil from the north / January 19, 2015
What Air force one for this fellow? He should be flying on an Ox-Cart made by Medamulana Handiworks Corp.
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