SANA'A June 29. 2024 (Saba) -The Yemeni Tourism Union issued a statement regarding the planes of the national carrier at Sana'A airport. It reads as follows:
We are surprised by the cacophony of the mercenaries of the aggression against the measures taken to rearrange the status of Yemen Airways in accordance with the protocol of its establishment, while they have not denounced the suffering of 25 million citizens for many years due to the siege of Sana'a airport, which resulted in the following:
1- Raising the cost of travel to three times the value of the ticket for the Yemeni citizen in Sana'a and neighboring governorates, which have been economically besieged for several years until the majority of citizens were unable to travel, especially humanitarian and sick cases, which led to the death of thousands.
Due to the operation of one flight from Sana'a, whose tickets are sold outside Yemen through the black market and worth up to two thousand dollars through the black market, the majority are forced to travel from Aden airport, the average value of the ticket from Aden to Amman is $ 540, and the car to transport the traveler from Sana'a to Aden and back costs $ 500, and the stay in Aden costs at least a week to obtain a new passport with residence $ 600 as a minimum, so that the total cost is about two thousand and 640 dollars per person, while the cost of a Yemeni citizen residing in Aden to buy a ticket and obtain a passport is less than $ 500 or $ 550 maximum if the cheapest class is not available, as the reservation is confirmed for them on a cheaper degree and the cost of the passport for them is symbolic and there are no hotel and restaurant expenses for them? Why don't these horns denounce this injustice against the traveler from Sana'a? Who benefits from tripling the cost for Yemeni citizens? Does the Yemeni administration in Aden feel responsible as a national carrier in this case?
2- Operating one humanitarian flight per day from Sana'a to serve 80 percent of the Yemeni people, while seven flights are operated daily from Aden and Seiyun to serve 20 percent of the Yemeni people? Where is humanity in this division? This is injustice and discrimination in dealing that cannot be carried out by any national carrier because the goal of national transport is to facilitate travel for citizens throughout the country without any discrimination.
3- Forcing more than a thousand Yemeni citizens daily to travel by land from Sana'a for a period ranging from 14 to 20 hours in arduous ways through valleys and mountains and through dozens of security points in order to travel from Aden airport while Sana'a airport is not more than half an hour away from them, thousands have died in these roads in accidents or drowning in torrents in the middle of the valleys or because of their poor health, and many have permanent disabilities due to poor road and because of their critical health condition? We haven't heard these trumpets denounce this systematic torture for years.
4- Fighting Yemeni agents in Sana'a, especially openly, so the seats on them for Sana'a / Amman flights were completely closed and sold from outside Yemen, and the agents in Sana'a do not show the low price grades, while they appear to agents in the south and abroad, and recently the system was completely closed to agents in Sana'a without any legal excuse? What are the violations committed by the agents in Sana'A to have the regime shut down on them completely? There is no legal excuse! The only reason that the Yemeni administration in Aden has become treating agents in Sana'A with racism and considers them an adversary because of their presence in Sana'A and trying to pressure the agents to move to Aden to open the regime? Are these the actions of a neutral national carrier?
5- With the aim of selling Sana'a / Amman tickets from outside Yemen, the Yemeni administration in Aden encouraged sales through the black market through its employees from outside Yemen and created an illegal distribution network that led to raising ticket prices to imaginary numbers, and these amounts are transferred abroad through money changers and other methods contrary to the financial regulations adopted by international airlines.
There is no respected airline in the world, even a commercial one, that practices such legal, financial and professional transgressions, and this indicates the absence of control in the company and there is no one to hold such abuses accountable, which allows the management to commit any legal and financial abuses that make it incapacitated.
6- The Yemeni administration in Aden amended the automated reservation system at the beginning of 2024, so that it allowed withholding seats from agents individually at the level of each agency separately, while this authority does not exist in the regulations of airlines around the world, as the seats are either lowered to all agents or withheld from all of them, and this confirms that their intention is to stop sales in the northern governorates completely, and the matter was a matter of time and no more.
7- The Yemeni administration in Aden turned into a competitor for travel agents to the extent that they refused to confirm the reservation for the traveler issuing a ticket from a travel agent and forced him to issue a ticket from the Yemenia office and force the traveler to retrieve the value of the ticket from the agent? If the ticket is used for the outbound, the refund amount is not up to $ 100 while the new ticket for the same section will not be less than $ 400 to $ 600? This behavior cannot happen from any airline in the world with its agents who officially represent it.
The actions of the Yemeni administration in Aden seek to distort the reputation of the agent and pressure the traveler to buy tickets from Yemenia offices, which are supposed to be offices to serve the traveler and assist him in the first place, not a competitor for the agents?.
The Yemeni administration in Aden has crossed all red lines as a national carrier and has become working according to purely personal interests in the first place, politicized and clearly biased towards the merchants of war, and even maintains their interests and economic investments in Aden from hotels, restaurants and service facilities and increasing revenues in the Passports Authority by forcing thousands of citizens to travel from Aden airport by besieging Sana'a airport and preventing the increase of flights from it and preventing the landing of other airlines, such as preventing the landing of Balqees Airlines in Sana'a last year. And punish Balqees Airlines at the time by stopping two flights to Aden, and the Yemeni fighter Al-Saeeda Airlines in Aden until it went bankrupt and fought Air Alexandria in Aden and took it out of the market.
The Yemeni administration in Aden has become openly seeking a monopoly and preventing any competition to maintain its fantastic prices, deteriorating services, unfair treatment of travelers and travel agents, and support the continuation of the black market.
The planes at Sana'a airport belong to the people and are parked in their right place and cannot claim ownership by a specific person, company or entity, and because these aircraft were not used fairly to serve the Yemeni people, but were misused for personal and political interests, it is the duty of the government to stop these aircraft and correct this unjust situation that is paid for by the owners of these aircraft from the Yemeni people who are first and last affected by an unjust and unjustified blockade.
We call on our leadership to resolve this problem so that all airports of the Republic of Yemen and the national carrier work to serve the people according to the actual needs of the people and according to the protocol established by Yemen Airways, and to stop legal, financial and professional violations and abuses by the Yemeni administration in Aden in order to preserve the public property of the Yemeni people and end the suffering of the precious citizens forced to travel from Aden airport.
We do not know whether we are in a state of truce or a state of war, and why the airspace continues to be closed and airlines are prevented from disembarking in Sana'a as long as we are in a truce? We also call on citizens to refrain from buying tickets from outside their governorates and to demand through social media to open sales to travel agents in all governorates, increase flights from Sana'a airport, as well as increase airlines to break Yemen's monopoly and reduce their imaginary prices.
E.M
resource : Saba
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