Pakistan’s government has succumbed to the European Union’s pressure and amended its aviation laws to address the past deficiencies that led to the suspension of its flight operations to Europe and other destinations following the fake pilot license scandal of 2020.
The National Assembly passed two bills – the Pakistan Civil Aviation Act, 2023, and the Pakistan Airports Authority Act, 2023 – in a hurry to pave the way for the return of the national flag carrier flights to Europe and beyond.
The move came after the European Union’s Aviation Safety Agency (EASA) revoked the Pakistan International Airline’s authorisation to fly to the bloc in 2020 after it was revealed that 262 of Pakistan’s 860 pilots had obtained fake licenses. The scandal also resulted in the grounding of PIA’s flight PK8303 that crashed in Karachi on May 22, 2020, killing 97 people.
The new laws will bifurcate the role of Civil Aviation in Pakistan into two entities: one responsible for regulations and the other for provision of services and development of infrastructure.
The federal minister for aviation, Khawaja Saad Rafique, said that the PIA was likely to resume flights to Britain in the next three months and later to Europe and America.
However, the opposition parties criticised the government for rushing through the legislation without proper debate and scrutiny. They accused the government of compromising the national interest and sovereignty by bowing to the EU’s pressure.