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Executives at the Ethiopian Airports Enterprise (EAE)
are grumbling in disappointment following a massive
reshuffle last week in which eight top managers were
given forced leave.
Enterprise’s board of directors, led by Ministry of
Mines and Energy Alemayu Tegenu, recommended the
decision in a temporary restructuring study. A
letter signed by Eyob Estifanos, General Manager of
EAE, was issued to the eight managers on October 24,
2007.
The executives who received forced leave memos were
Tekle Borena, General Manager of Finance Department,
Gebrielu Vitale, General Manager of Regional
Airports, Mesfin Belay, ICT Service Head, Tadele
Addis, Legal Service Head, Tsehaynesh Teshome,
General Manager of Procurement and Property
Department, Solomon Yimer, Head of Corporate
Management Department, Tsehaye Asfeha, Head of Civil
Service Reform Bureau and Tassew Tekle, Public
Relations Head.
These staff members have been notified to hand over
properties of the enterprise at their disposal and
take a forced leave as of tomorrow.
“We are shocked to receive this letter,” a member of
the list told Fortune. “After the
establishment of the enterprise in 2002, we are the
ones who brought the enterprise to this level, with
our leadership. And we were expecting to be
rewarded.”
EAE manages 14 airports around the country,
including Addis Abeba, and was previously part of
Civil Aviation Authority. It later became an
independent body following complaints lodged against
it by various foreign lending institutions for
failure to repay loans it secured for the
construction of airports.
Before the restructuring, EAE had 13 departments,
each reporting to the director. Now, the company
will have just four departments and three deputy
managers. EAE has a total of about 930 employees.
The three deputy general managers are from airport
engineering, which holds the IT and regional airport
departments, led by Shiferaw Alemu.
The procurement and finance departments are now
under human resources, which is led by a new
appointee, Teshome Dejene while the Bole Airports
remain under the same deputy general manager, Hailay
Gebretasadik.
One of the deposed managers complained to Fortune
that the restructuring plan had not been studied
by foreign consultants given the working
relationship EAE has with international companies.
“I first came to this enterprise in May 2007. Since
the enterprise was in a lot of problems, we have
sent out questioners for the employees to find out
how the service quality could improve. From that
survey, we found out that the service quality could
be improved in short and long term,” Eyob told
Fortune. “In short term, since the enterprise’s
problem is related to human resources, we had to
appoint qualified staff in the positions, and the
ones with less efficiencies to their appropriate
positions. And this is how we have made the
reshuffling,” Eyob told Fortune.
According to Eyob, a study is being conducted for
long-term planning which will be informed by
international consultants.
A source told Fortune that even though the
replaced management members did not have problems in
competence, they had problems in willingness and
commitment, and expected young professionals to be
appointed in their positions.
Of the airports administered by the Enterprise,
Addis Abeba, Diredawa, Mekele and Bahir Dar are
international-standard airports.
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