"What happens with the government? After the bankruptcy of Adam Air and Mandala Air (several years ago), now it is Batavia Air is declared bankrupt," Astindo chairman for Riau Province, Ibnu Mas`ud said.
Pekanbaru, Riau (ANTARA News) - The Indonesian Airline Ticketing Association (Astindo) for Riau province office said the government should be responsible for the bankruptcy of Batavia Air as declared by a court on Wednesday.

"What happens with the government? After the bankruptcy of Adam Air and Mandala Air (several years ago), now it is Batavia Air is declared bankrupt," Astindo chairman for Riau Province, Ibnu Mas`ud said here on Friday.

He questioned the fate of money passengers had paid for tickets as well as the deposit money travel agents had transferred to Batavia Air.

Ibnu said that the government, in this case the ministry of transportation should have learned a lesson from previous cases. The ministry which issued permits and carried out supervision should be responsible this case.

He said that over the past few years several airlines had been declared bankrupt such as Sempati Air, Jatayu Airlines, Adam Air, Buraq Indonesia, Indonesia Airlines and Linus Airways. All this disadvantaged the people.

Starting last Thursday, privately owned Batavia Air halted operations following a Central Jakarta Commercial Court ruling that declared the carrier bankrupt for failing to pay for aircraft it had leased.

Previously, the International Lease Finance Corporation (ILFC) filed a bankrupt petition against the carrier after it had failed to pay US$4.68 million for two leased Airbus A330s for three yeas.

The debts matured on December 31, 2012.

On Thursday, Astindo chairwoman Elly Hutabarat urged Batavia Air to refund the money that the travel agents have deposited with the bankrupt airlines.

"The travel agents called on Batavia Air to refund the travel agents` funds they have deposited with Batavia Air," Elly Hutabarat said.

Elly said that the deposit funds that had been transferred to Batavia air belonged to travel agents. They were not part of Batavia Air assets.

She said that the funds were deposited with Batavia Air for the issuance of tickets or flight seat reservations.

Elly said with that payment system, the operation of the airlines was actually financed by travel agents.

"The court`s decision on the bankruptcy of Batavia Air is a disaster for travel agents which are members of Astindo," she said.

Elly expressed regret that such a bankruptcy had happened several times, and it once again victimized travel agents.

She said that to prevent travel agents from becoming victims in in the future, Astindo has asked the Ministry of Transportation to regulate the placement of deposit funds with airlines by travel agents.

"Regulations should provide that the deposit funds should be placed at an escrow account where funds could be withdrawn by travel agents anytime when an airlines stopped operating," she said.

Earlier, Batavia Air management said that it had appointed four trustees to help handle all matters related to the closing of the airlines.

"All interested parties are expected to wait for directives from the trustees," Batavia Air Public Relations Officer Elly Simanjuntak said on Wednesday.(*)

Editor: Heru Purwanto
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