KUALA LUMPUR, April 23 ― The chief executive officer of suspended Rayani Air, Ravi Alagendrran, has promised to pay his staff their owed wages after they threatened legal action.
The Star Online reported that Ravi, however, also threatened to retrench half of the company's employees to strengthen operations.
“Yes, I will pay them. I have investors. Look at them (the staff), you think they can bring in investors?
“They are following their emotions like children,” Ravi was quoted telling the English-language daily. “I am going to throw away all these people”.
Ravi reportedly alleged that a strike by his staff was the main factor that drove away investors, causing the country's first Shariah compliant airline to end up in a financial mess.
National newswire Bernama yesterday reported that Rayani Air staff were threatening to take legal action if salary arrears of RM1.5 million due to about 400 of its workers in March are not paid up by next Tuesday.
Zulkalnain Azdan, Rayani Air operations manager at the Kuala Lumpur International Airport 2 (klia2), who led the press conference, was reported saying that the lawsuit would be filed against Ravi and his wife Datuk Karthiyani Govindan, both of whom own the airline.
Zulkalnain had also claimed that the employees’ Employees Provident Fund (EPF) contributions were not in order.
On Thursday, Ravi was reported by Malay-language news portal mStar Online claiming that eight companies have expressed interest to invest in Rayani Air that the government has provisionally suspended for three months starting April 11.
He also reportedly said he was mulling selling off more than half of the ownership shares in the company.
