In Italy, the call rises to let Alitalia fall
Lorenzo Schapira tries to avoid flying Italy's near-bankrupt flagship carrier, Alitalia. The planes are run-down and the service is "appalling," he says.
"The government should let Alitalia go bust," the 52-year-old who runs a disco and a sports club near Milan said on board a flight on rival carrier Air One from Rome to Milan.
He's not alone. Travelers interviewed last week at Milan's Linate and Rome's Fiumicino airports said that they'd given up on Alitalia and that politicians should too. About three-quarters of Italians disapprove of the government's 300-million-euro ($473 million) bailout for the carrier, according to a June 5 online poll published by daily newspaper Corriere della Sera.
"Airlines go bankrupt all over the world," said Alessandro Rovere, who works in the computer industry in Milan. "I don't see why Italy shouldn't do the same for Alitalia."
State-controlled Alitalia posts losses of about 3 million euros a day. No buyer has surfaced for the carrier since Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi said during his election campaign in April that a large number of buyers had answered his appeal to keep Alitalia in Italian hands.
It's "a question not only of pride but of national security," he said April 9 on RAI state radio in Rome.
The emergency loan is buying little more than three months' worth of oil.
"I hoped Berlusconi would stop pouring money into Alitalia," said Sara Chiappara, 33, a textbook editor for a Milan publisher. "It's unbelievable. We've done our part for Alitalia. It's enough."
Alitalia Chairman Aristide Police told shareholders June 28 in Rome that the airline faced its "last chance" to avoid filing for bankruptcy. The stock lost almost half its value this year before its trading was suspended June 4 pending a sale.
The government has given bank Intesa Sanpaolo until the end of July to have a plan to improve the airline's finances.
Former Alitalia Chairman Maurizio Prato told labor unions that "only an exorcist could save it" after worker opposition to job cuts scuttled takeover talks with Air France-KLM Group in April.
Even Alitalia's largest labor union, Filt-Cgil, says the current bailout is useless without clear measures to boost market share and make money. Italy has injected about 3 billion euros into Alitalia in the last decade.
