Grounded for about forty days due to a strike, Air Madagascar planes will finally be able to fly again. The top management and striking employees of the national Malagasy company have indeed signed in the evening of Friday 18 July a memorandum of understanding to put an end to this stoppage.

“This agreement will put an end to the deadlock at Air Madagascar” indicated the new chairman of the board, Léon Rajaobelina, who however specified that flights would not restart immediately.

“All personnel will resume work, but we cannot make the mistake of restarting flights tomorrow or the day after”, he added insisting on the need to “check on the aircrafts to ensure the safety of the passengers”.

The signing of the agreement comes nine days after the appointment of a new board of directors by the government and the resignation of the managing director of the national airline company Air Madagascar.

“This is a great agreement”, enthused Eric Koller, president of the national tourism office in Madagascar who estimated that the players of the tourism sector registered losses “of about 50% to 60%”.

300 employees out of the total 1,200 of Air Madagascar took part in the strike that started on 15 June and which grew in intensity following the sacking of the leaders of the movement and their appearance before the Court.