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SriLankan pilot-selection review remains grounded
View(s):By Namini Wijedasa
SriLankan Airlines is reviewing its entire trainee pilots’ selection process as a consequence of an ongoing dispute between its pilots and senior management. “There has been no final decision on the recruitment process,” said SriLankan Airlines CEO Kapila Chandrasena. “The short listing process for the cadet pilots’ training programme is being reviewed as a whole.”
“We may not change it at all,” he stressed. “But it is being reviewed by the Ministry of Civil Aviation and other stakeholders, in order to arrive at a win-win situation. The flying aptitude test is only one part of it. We are looking at the whole thing to derive at a fair and equitable process,” he said.
The selection process includes a written exam, a technical competency test and a simulator aptitude test. Candidates must pass each with a score of 70 or above to be short-listed as a trainee pilot at SriLankan.
The senior management of SriLankan Airlines sparked off a controversy five weeks ago, when it “indiscriminately” lowered the qualifying score for the simulator aptitude test by five points to 65. The Airline Pilots’ Guild of Sri Lanka continues to fly the roster in protest. This means they are not taking on extra flights—something they had routinely done to meet a shortfall of pilots at SriLankan.
Mr. Chandrasena said the objective of ongoing deliberations was to “match intake with our training capacities”. The management has maintained that the selection score was lowered to increase the number of local pilots recruited to SriLankan.
“A review of the short listing process is an area that should ideally be handled by the Training Department of SriLankan Airlines,” said Pilots’ Guild President Captain Ruwan Vithanage, in response. “In any case, the constraints faced by the airline in training candidates, notably insufficient capacity, have not changed.”
The Guild says SriLankan is so short of training capacity that it has even reduced the number of pilot intakes this year from three to two.
Mr. Chandrasena said the dispute was now with the Ministry of Civil Aviation. “We expect a resolution soon which would be equitable and favourable to all,” he asserted. T.R.C. Ruberu, Secretary to the Ministry of Civil Aviation, said he will present a report to Minister Priyankara Jayaratne this week.
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