Ethiopian Airlines leaves Brussels Airport with loss of 'hundreds of jobs'

Ethiopian Airlines is moving its cargo operations out of Brussels Airport to Maastricht in the Netherlands because of a continuing dispute between the airports at Brussels and Liège, the company said. The decision, which takes effect on 1 November, would lead to the loss of “hundreds of jobs,” according to airport CEO Arnaud Feist.

Federal mobility minister Jacqueline Galant announced two months ago that she would recommend not renewing the traffic rights of Ethiopian because the company, which flies for courier company DHL out of Zaventem, was damaging the business of competitor TNT, which flies out of Liège. Ethiopian chose not to await the results of talks to be held in November, electing to make a pre-emptive move.

The company will operate nine flights a week out of Maastricht, four more than it operated out of Zaventem. “Brussels has lost hundreds of jobs, while Liège gains nothing,” Flemish mobility minister Ben Weyts said. “It’s incomprehensible how people can throw such a spanner in the works of the economic growth of Brussels. When it suits them, they embrace the airport as Bruxelles-National. The rest of the time it’s Zaventem, the Flemish airport. The hypocrisy has to stop.”

Meanwhile, a group of residents of the Flemish periphery of Brussels, who suffer most from noise nuisance from the airport, have defended the continued existence of night flights. “A ban on night flights is not realistic in a 24-hour economy,” said Bart Loones-Franck, who has lived in Berg for 22 years and who has organised a group of sympathisers. “Zaventem is good for more than 40,000 jobs directly and indirectly. That’s more than Liège and Charleroi combined. And these are mainly jobs for low-skilled people – something you never hear mentioned by the groups protesting noise from the airport.”

Earlier this month, the mayors from all 19 of Brussels communes unanimously agreed to a resolution calling for a ban on night flights between 22.00 and 7.00. The motion called for a better spread of cargo and low-cost activities over the regional airports.

The resolution was not supported by the mayors’ colleagues in the periphery. “Scrapping night flights would mean the loss of cargo airport Brucargo, with consequences for employment,” said Machelen mayor Jean-Pierre De Groef.

Photo: Konstantin von Wedelstaedt/Wikimedia