Male’, Maldives – The Ministry of Finance of Maldives has reannounced to conduct a valuation of Addu International Airport, seeking a party interested to carry out the task.
The Ministry revealed that due to the applications which came in with regards to the valuation announcement made by the Ministry on 13th of September, it has been decided to make an announcement again, with a revised terms of reference (TOR). The Ministry urges any interested candidates to inform the Ministry prior to 13:30 of 28th October, 2020
During the earlier announcement, the Ministry revealed that the purpose of this valuation is to determine the problematic areas of the airport and to find a way to resolve any such issues.
As per the audit report by the Auditor General’s Office in 2019, the airport earned a total of MVR 65,030,122. However, with the expenses of the airport at MVR 101,951,807, the company incurred a loss of MVR 60,338,985.
Addu International Airport company was formed with shares held by the government, State Trading Organization (STO), Maldives Airports Company Limited (MACL) and Champa Hussain Afeef’s Casa Holdings. However, STO has since left the company. In addition, the SOE committee of the parliament has decided to request the Ministry of Finance to hasten the letting go of the 10% ownership of MACL from the company as well.
The development of Gan International Airport was finished in 2016, during which the runway of the airport was extended by 3,400 meters and widened by 60 meters, allowing wide body aircrafts to operate at the facility. After this development, Sri Lankan Airlines started scheduled trips to Gan via the airport, which has now been put a pause on, due to the Covid-19 pandemic.
