Shares trading in indebted Kenya Airways suspended for another year as restructuring falters

Trading in Kenya Airways shares has been suspended for another year, as the indebted national carrier battles to return to profitability and the country’s president says he wants to sell the government’s stake.

Stocks in the troubled airline have not been traded since July 2020 in the midst of the Covid-19 pandemic, which devastated global air travel. “The extension of suspension seeks to enable the company [to] complete its operational and corporate restructure process,” the Nairobi Securities Exchange said in a statement on Wednesday.

In December last year, Kenyan President William Ruto said the government was ready to sell its entire 48,9% stake in the airline, which has been deep in debt for years. The Air France-KLM consortium owns 7.8% of Kenya Airways, while the rest is owned by private owners and banks.

“I’m willing to sell the whole of Kenya Airways,” Ruto told the press during his first visit to the United States as Kenya’s president last month. “I’m not in the business of running an airline that just has a Kenyan flag — that’s not my business,” said Ruto, who reportedly met executives from US carrier Delta Air Lines during the trip.

The national carrier woes worsened two months ago when pilots staged a days-long strike, which led to hundreds of flight cancellations and stranded thousands of passengers. It also defaulted on a $525 million loan from the US Export-Import Bank last year. The airline, whose slogan is “The Pride of Africa”, was founded in 1977 after the demise of East African Airways and now flies more than four million passengers to 42 destinations annually.