VOI - Voice of Indonesia | RRI - Radio Republik Indonesia

On Wednesday, 12 September 2018, in Tangerang, Banten, based on the Extraordinary General Meeting of Shareholders, I Gusti Ngurah Askhara Danadiputra or Ari Askhara officially served as President Director of PT Garuda Indonesia, replacing Pahala N Mansury.

Throughout 2017, PT Garuda Indonesia suffered a loss worth US$213.4 million dollars, equivalent to Rp2.88 trillion. In 2016, Garuda managed to record a net profit worth US$9.4 million or around Rp126.9 billion. The losses during 2017 were due to increased spending by 13%, from US$3.7 billion to 4.25 billion dollars, mainly due to an increase in fuel costs by 25% from US$924 million to 1.15 billion dollars.

Ari Askhara has a target to reduce PT Garuda Indonesia's losses to less than US$ 100 million at the end of 2018 by closing the operating costs leakage gap, optimizing favorite routes, opening good economic value routes and improving employee performance. From 2013 to 2018, Askhara was a director of a number of companies, such as Director of Finance and Garuda Risk, and lastly in 2018, he served as President Director of PT Pelindo III.

Askhara will involve all employees and regulators in achieving the target. Part of his experience at Pelindo III will be applied on Garuda. One of them is the transformation of human capital. Because Garuda Indonesia is engaged in the service sector, employees’ happiness is very important so that service to passengers increases. Furthermore, he will attempt to increase revenue by creating new routes at several points of foreign tourist sources, and optimizing the old domestic routes compared to international ones.

To reduce operating costs and prevent inefficiency, there will be renegotiation of incoming aircraft leases, especially for narrow body and wide body existing flights in a bid to extend the lease period. So, the monthly rental fee will decrease by 10-20%.

Amid Rupiah’s worsening conditions and rising oil prices, the next step to be taken is redefining cost structure, changing and improving operational costs.

Along with other directors, such as Commercial Director -Pikri Ilham Kurniansyah, Director of Cargo and Business Development -M Iqbal, Operations Director Bambang -Adi Surya, Director of Finance and Risk Management -Fuad Rizal, HR Director -Heri Akhyat, Technical Director -I Wayan Susena and Service Director - Nicodemus P Lampe, Ari Askhara with the support of shareholders will try to realize the achievement of the target to reduce PT Garuda Indonesia's losses to below US$ 100 million by the end of 2018.

With the experience of leading various divisions in various companies along with the management of the new Garuda Indonesia, Ari Askhara's strong commitment is expected to become a reality, instead of writing on paper, with the support of various parties.

That’s Commentary!