Trade unions slam Paris takeover

Unions unhappy with Zagreb concession

Trade unions at Zagreb Airport have angrily reacted to the government’s decision to award a concession for Croatia’s busiest airport to Aéroports de Paris. The French are to run Zagreb Airport for the next thirty years and build a multi million euro terminal. Unions say that the entire concession model is unsustainable. The head of the union representing Zagreb Airport employees, Ante Dujić, said at a press conference that workers expected the government to terminate the tender procedure because the concession will harm the airport and its employees. He added that Zagreb Airport has the means to fund the expansion project itself.

The union claims that estimates for Zagreb Airport to handle up to 8.5 million passengers annually, as outlined by Aérports de Paris, are inaccurate. They warn that during the past month two airlines operating flights to Zagreb have declared bankruptcy while Croatia Airlines itself is on shaky grounds. Unions are now requesting an urgent meeting with the government and warn that industrial action could be taken if their concerns are not acknowledged. “The commission which decided to award the concession had no time to review the documentation in order to bring a proper decision. There is a problem and our destinies depend on its resolution”, Dujić said.

Aéroports de Paris, which bid under the name Zagreb Airport International, will build the new terminal at Zagreb from scratch and pay 87 million euros in concession fees over the next three decades. The new terminal should be in use by 2015. The offer by Aéroports de Paris outlines that during the first phase of the project a new terminal will be built with the capacity to handle five million passengers.