Kenya Airways CEO Mbuvi Ngunze set to step down

Kenya Airways boss Mbuvi Ngunze is set to step down and exit the troubled airline in March next year.

While accepting Mr Ngunze’s departure, KQ board chairman Michael Joseph said Mr Ngunze, after working for the company for five years, “felt it was a natural point in the company’s evolution to pass on the baton.”

“While I regret this decision, I respect his position. Mbuvi will stay on until a successor is found which is expected to take some months,” said Mr Joseph.

“The selection of the next CEO will be a thoughtful process led by myself together with the board governance and nominations committee, which will focus on producing the right outcomes to lead KQ into its next chapter,” he added in a statement.

Mr Joseph, who took over as the board’s chairman on October 26 this year, said the process of picking Mr Ngunze’s replacement will take three months.

“During this period, the board chairman and the group managing director and CEO will work with the rest of the KQ senior leadership team to ensure continuity during the transition,” he said.

Shortly after assuming the hot seat at KQ, the former Safaricom chief said Mr Ngunze was part of his team to turn around the airline as he rejected demands by pilots that the CEO leave.

The pilots, under the Kenya Airline Pilots Association, had for several months pushed for the resignation of Mr Ngunze and then chairman Dennis Awori, whom they accused of mismanaging the airline.

In October, Mr Awori resigned as KQ’s board chairman after 11 months after the airline’s major shareholders made boardroom changes.

The shareholders — the Treasury and Dutch airline KLM — had promised the airline’s employees that changes would be made before the end of that month.

Those found culpable of theft at the troubled airline, Transport Cabinet Secretary James Macharia said as he announced the changes, would not be spared and would be prosecuted.

Mr Ngunze and Mr Awori were accused by pilots of making bad decisions with travel agents, irregular leasing of aircrafts and sale of others at poor prices with poor documentation.

With the exit of the CEO, Mr Joseph is optimistic it will not affect the carrier's business, though he acknowledged there are a myriad of challenges that he said were not unique to the airline.

“What is critical is that these challenges have been faced with measured responses that are now clearly bearing fruit,” he said.

He added: “As we look to the future, the operational turnaround must stay in focus, but so too the financial stability of the business.”