The tourism industry in Africa is booming and Ghana is one of the economies that want to cash in on the boom. How far will they go, especially as regards reviving the national carrier Ghana Airways? The African continent is booming at the moment, and with the potentials of annual growth of 4.6% through business and tourism until 2036. This an attractive piece of pie for all African leaders and the and not through commercial Ghanaian government is doing everything to have a bite of this judgment pie and is thus determined to revive its ailing National airline. The question remains, do most African nations need a national carrier? Well, with success stories like Ethiopian Airlines and Rwanda Air, off from the continent of Africa, it is no wonder that most governments are thinking in that line. Despite the failure of several national carriers which is the typical African airline story, Ghana and other countries are hoping to emulate and hopefully succeed with their own national airline story. Yet it seems that the need to have a national carrier is often borne out of sentiments to have some sort of national identity to the global audience 1, 2020, with passengers mandated to undergo Covid-19 tests on entry to Ghana. The Ghanaian government has renewed its plans to revive its national airline with the planned purchase of nine planes, and also hopes to compete with big international carriers that control 80% of traffic in Africa. The question remains, would they achieve it? Would there be a need instead of having an initiative like the Single African Air Transport Market, which is a more commercially viable venture that would also liberate the African airspace?
Brief History
For the longest time, Ghana Airways Limited was the national airline of the Republic of Ghana with its main hub at Kotoka International Airport in Accra. Ghana Airways was founded on 4 July 1958 by the government of Ghana with a start-up capital of £400,000; the Government-held 60% shares, while BOAC held the remaining 40% in a seven-year agreement signed between Ghana Airways and BOAC. The agreement also involved BOAC personnel, training the Ghanaian personnel for them to take over management and operation of the airline shortly. Before the advent of Ghana Airways, BOAC and West African Airways Corporation was responsible for international services from Ghana and West Africa to London, until Ghana Airways started operating the Accra–London route on 16 July 1958 with a Boeing 377 Stratocruiser, which carried the Ghanaian flag in a minimally adapted form from that of the UK carrier. On 30 September of that same year, Ghana Airways’ relationship with West African Airways ceased and on 1 October, they started operating the domestic and regional flights formerly offered by WAAC. The first aircraft to be registered in Ghana since the nation became independent was a de Havilland Heron, delivered on 30 December and within one year they had made a net profit of US$28,000.
The airline went through so many transitions from acquiring new fleets, to agreements with the Soviet Union, to flying the following routes, Accra to Lagos, Dakar, Addis Ababa, Nairobi, and totaled a net profit of US$462,000. Ghana Airways resumed flights to the United States from July 1962, with plans to extend to Tokyo and Sydney, and later achieved being the first West African airline to serve the Lebanese capital.
Ghana Airways after scaling through some hurdles, grew to operate domestic flights from Accra to Kumasi, Takoradi, and Tamale, with regional flights to Abidjan, Bamako, Bathurst, Conakry, Dakar Freetown, Lagos, and Monrovia. Its international route networks were Addis Ababa, Beirut, Cairo, Khartoum, London, Rabat, Rome, Zürich, and then Asmara, Switzerland, and Moscow, although those flights were short-lived.
Challenges
Ghana Airlines went through so many tumultuous and seemingly avoidable challenges for a period of 43 years, spanning 1961-2004. These challenges saw many transitions, buying and returning air fleets, sales of some airplanes, pool arrangements with Nigeria Airways via Lagos, surviving a government coup, plying international destinations such as Amsterdam, Douala, Frankfurt, Jeddah, Libreville and Niamey, Barbados, London, South Africa, Dakar, Baltimore, Dubai, Banjul and later the United States.
The airline experienced severe flight hurdles, threats from stranded passengers, legal judgments and seizure of one of the airlines’ DC-10s at Heathrow Airport by a British creditor, and finally a ban by the US Department of Transportation from operating flights into or out of the US. The challenges never ended or so it seems and after the ban, the Ghana government sacked the Ghana Airways board and took over full control of the airline to ‘prevent further damage to the coming national airline’ according to Kwadwo Mpiani, the Presidential Chief of Staff. However, things spiraled to ground zero after some angry passengers took a Ghana Airways pilot hostage at Kokota International Airport, after several days of flight delays, this led to an emergency meeting between President John Kufuor with the police and airline officials and the outcome of that emergency meeting was the final grinding of Ghana Airways in 2004.
Restart
Ghana Airways has been planning to revive its airline since 2020 in partnership with Egypt Air. This had become necessary as it has grown its aviation industry to four international airports, namely Kotoka, Tamale, Kumasi, and Takoradi, which had been effectively managed by the Ghana Airports Company Limited, despite not having a national carrier.
Kotoka International Airport in Accra remains the best international airport in Ghana with connecting flights to many places around the globe, while Kumasi International Airport serves the Ashanti region after it was upgraded to an international airport through a renovation project valued at $300 Million. Tamale International Airport was also a domestic airline that was upgraded to serve the people of Tamale in 2008. And so was Takoradi airport which was upgraded as well. Ghana has achieved a commendable feat from one international airport country to four, through a partnership between the Ghana Airports Company Limited and the government to ensure that international airports are established. And today, Ghanaians enjoy faster and easier travel to any part of the globe, and this has also improved the economic growth of the country as there is a heavy influx of tourism into Ghana. This is commendable, especially because most of Ghana’s neighbors including Nigeria, are still struggling to establish or upgrade their local airports to international at a seemingly slow pace.
As of today, the major international flights that ply into Ghana are British Airways, KLM, Emirates, Air France, Ethiopian Air, MEA, Kenya Airways, Brussels Airways, Medview Airlines, Royal Air Maroc, Rwanda Air, Turkish Airlines, South African Airway, Delta Air, TAP, Egypt Air and Portugal Airlines, United Airlines, etc. These have become a major income resource for the Ghanaian government to the extent that there are now plans to turn the remaining domestic airports of Wa, Yendi, Navrongo, and Takoradi into international airports.
The domestic airline in Ghana as of today has an interesting twist from the story of the vibrant international airports because Passion Air is the only current domestic airline and it plies across the four airports of Takoradi, Kumasi, Kotoka, and Tamala with a standard one-way flight from Accra to Kumasi costing an approximate N46/47000 Naira or 43 Dollars.
What we do not know is how far gone the plans to resume a national carrier for Ghana Airways have been achieved, and what new plans or partnerships are in the works as of 2021. In a bid to get more accurate information, an email sent to the Ghana Ministry of Aviation, asking for these details on way forward with Ghana Airways was not responded to as at press time. We however believe that the Ghanaian Airline should use a more future-forward approach regarding their domestic and international airlines, especially on the question of reviving its national carrier which would need lots of funding or operating as it is, with various international airlines berthing into the country, which been more of a business boom than doom for the country. The choice is theirs in the quest to embark on this journey of a thousand miles
