Kenya Airways puts 9-month pretax loss at $59m

Kenya Airways says its nine-month pretax loss stood at 5.97 billion shillings ($59.03 million) and after-tax loss, 6.1 billion shillings.

The airline’s Chief Executive Officer, Sebastian Mikosz, said on Wednesday in Nairobi that the loss was due to a prolonged election period in the country and rising fuel prices.

“Elections contributed to a 20 per cent drop in domestic traffic,” Mikosz said.

The Acting Chief Financial Officer, Hellen Mwariri, also told Reuters that the airline’s nine-month operating profit, however, stood at 1.3 billion shillings.

Kenya spent most of 2017 conducting elections. Effects of drought also retarded the country’s economic growth.

The airline, which is changing its financial year to match the calendar year, said that the number of its passenger stood at 3.4 million in the nine months which ended in December.

The airline completed a $2 billion debt restructuring in November as part of revival plans after a drop in Kenyan travel.

It is also facing high financing costs on new Boeing jets, which resulted in the country’s biggest ever corporate loss of 26 billion shillings in its 2016 financial year.