Air Malta to be replaced ‘by the end of the year’

The loss-making airline will be dissolved after the European Commission refused to allow the Maltese government to inject almost €300 million to save it. 

In an interview with The Times of Malta, the carrier’s chairman David Curmi said a five-year business plan for the new venture was close to finalisation. 

It is likely a similar situation will emerge as with Alitalia, which was dissolved and replaced with the state-backed airline ITA (Italia Trasporto Aereo). Curmi said the European Commission preferred this option and that the transition would be “seamless”, with a new booking platform under construction.

“We are nearing the end of long, difficult and complex discussions with the European Commission, which did not want a photocopy of Air Malta,” he told the newspaper.

He pledged the island would still have a national airline and that the new venture would not be conceived as a no-frills carrier.

Air Malta has already reduced its workforce from more than 1,000 to 330 in an attempt to make it commercially viable. Remaining staff will be made redundant and told to apply for jobs with the new venture.