Thai Airways trims gains as staff plan ‘go slow’ protest

Monday, 10 February 2014 00:00 - - {{hitsCtrl.values.hits}}

Reuters: Shares of Thai Airways Pcl trimmed earlier gains on Friday after employees of the national carrier said they plan to “go slow” at work next week and call for its chairman and acting president to resign for running the airline into losses. About 15,000 staff will take part in the partial strike starting on Monday, which could cause some flight delays, labour union president Damrong Waikanee told Reuters.

“As a leader of the labour union of Thai Airways, I want to apologise...It’s time for Thai Airways to press ahead with an organisational reform,” he said. The airline’s acting president, Chokchai Panyayong, issued a statement on Friday rejecting the so-called “go slow” plan and said employees across all units would work as normal. The airline has more than 24,000 staff on its books. The union is calling for Chokchai and chairman Ampon Kttiampon to resign after the airline posted a net loss of 6.2 billion baht ($188.88 million) in July-September quarter. The poor performance was attributed to foreign exchange loss and impairments on assets.