BY BARNABAS MANEBONA
NEW Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern is said to have announced they will be helping Solomon Islands again in the airport management reforms programme.
Solomon Islands Prime Minister Rick Houenipwela, during his press conference after returning from visits to Australia and New Zealand to reaffirm the countries longstanding relationships and discuss areas of interest, is very happy they covered this sector of issue in their discussions.
“For a number of years we have been trying to work this out as this is again tourism related to make our airports managed properly, efficiently, cleaner and so,” said PM Hou.
He said the previous and current government are continuing work on these reforms and the idea is to commercialise the management of all the country’s airports.
“That is already ongoing which in fact, a company has already been incorporated.
“Only work on it is a bit slow because in terms of human resources as well as on the financial side.
“But I am very happy the New Zealand Prime Minister has announced that they will be helping us again in that sector with NZ$2 Million for the reform programme.”
According to Hou, operations should start before the end of the year.
