Asiana Airlines unions to hold rallies this weekend

By Kim Jae-heun

Employees of Asiana Airlines and Kumho Asiana Group plan to stage rallies to protest alleged corruption and abuse of power by Chairman Park Sam-koo in the wake of the carrier's no in-flight meals fiasco.

According to the aviation industry, Thursday, they created an anonymous KakaoTalk chat room that has drawn more than 1,000 member, and agreed to hold the event at Gwanghwamun Square from today until Sunday. Another 1,000-member chat room has been created, as well.

Via the chat rooms, Asiana employees have raised allegations about the chairman's unfair business practices against subcontractors and unfair subsidies to affiliates as well as other acts of corruption.

About 500 employees are expected to participate in the protest.

“Asiana Airlines has to find measures to effectively deal with the situation. We are also asking the top management to take responsibility for the disruption,” said the union for Asiana's pilots in a statement.

The planned rallies come as the nation's second-largest airline has been hit hard for failing to supply meals on 120 international flights to 20,000 passengers, since Sunday. This has also caused delays of more than one hour for many long-distance flights.

As a protest against the delays the pilots union said it will “strictly adhere” to aviation laws.

According to the Safety of Aircraft Operation Act, pilots cannot fly a plane for more than 13 hours; and the union has said it will instruct its members to include time spent on the ground.

“We ban pilots from flying the planes with an empty stomach and we will check hygienic condition of our airline food meticulously. The health condition of the pilot connects directly with the flight safety,” the union said.

The cabin crew union also offered an apology to passengers, urging the chief managers to step down.

Amid the snowballing scandal, the chairman held an unscheduled press conference Wednesday to apologize and dispel “rumors” regarding the problem.

Asiana didn't renew the contract it had with LSG, a Lufthansa subsidiary, to supply in-flight meals; instead it switched to GGK, a Chinese supplier whose parent company is HNA Group, also the owner of Hainan Airlines.

The Chinese conglomerate allegedly invested 160 billion won ($143 million) to clinch the deal, which was denied by Park.

“Our decision to change the food supplier and obtaining Chinese investment are different matters. We changed our supplier because LSG refused to reveal their unit production cost, and GGK offered us better contract terms,” the chairman said.

“Hainan Airline's investment was because of our common goal to develop our East Asia businesses through a strategic partnership,” Park added.

However, LSG argued that Asiana didn't renew the contract because the subcontractor refused to invest 160 billion won in the carrier. LSG had been supplying in-flight meals to the airline for 15 years.

The appointment of the chairman's daughter Park Sae-jin to an executive post at Kumho Resort this month also contributed to his problems.

Asiana's unions argue that she was not qualified for the position as she was a full-time housewife until being appointed, and has no experience in company management.

“The resort unit is not very important for the entire group. I wanted my daughter to get management training at Kumho Resort,” Park said. “Her major is related to her position and I wanted her to make a small contribution to the company.”

Park Sae-jin graduated from Ewha Womans University and learned cooking at Le Cordon Bleu Tokyo and Le Cordon Bleu London. She also worked for the ANA InterContinental Tokyo between 2002 and 2005.