With Itvar as the GSA, Fiji Airways officially launched in the Middle East last week. As an offline carrier Fiji Airways has codeshare partnerships currently with Emirates, Singapore Airlines and Cathay Pacific with Singapore and Hong Kong as the connection points for the guests travelling from the Middle East. HE Naipota Tako Katonitabua – Ambassador – Republic of Fiji in UAE graced the occasion of the official launch and stated that the relationship between the UAE and Fiji has been a ling standing one not just with sports tourism but also with a mega project that will be announced soon by a hospitality developer in the UAE for a three million dollar project where the information will be disclosed soon.
Speaking with TTME, Sajid Khan Country Manager for India, Middle East and Sri Lanka of Fiji Airways shared, “We are very excited to have Fiji Airways in the Middle East and it has been here for almost a year but we don’t fly into Dubai or the Middle East. We are an offline carrier and we fly from Singapore, Hong Kong and Japan, these are our Asian points of connect, the plan has always been to connect from Dubai, from other parts of Middle East into Singapore, into Hong Kong and then onwards connect Fiji. The airport’s name is Nandi. We can also connect to Nandi via Australia and New Zealand and that’s always been the plan. We are now excited to be in Dubai and launch this officially so that we can give a new destination to our passengers based in Middle East who want to connect from Europe, Africa and we want to take them to the country where happiness find you, Fiji.” He further reiterated that Middle East is an important market as its positioned between the east and the west and that they want to explore opportunities to introduce Fiji to the rest of the GCC as well.
Dinkar Dasaur – General Manager – Satguru Travel, “we are delighted to be representatives of Fiji Airways in the Middle East and we look forward to growing our network with them. The intention and the commitment to them is basically for us to put their footprints globally. We are a huge network organisation spread across the globe and that is how we are going to make use of our network to promote Fiji Airways a new destination, a new avenue to take a breather, nature beauty that’s what Fiji brings in and what better way to reach Fiji than Fiji Airways. We are spread across 80 countries across the world and that’s a huge number, so we work in synergy, the entire network of Satguru and if we take a commitment, that commitment remains the commitment of the entire group. So when I promote Fiji from the Middle East I also synergise with my network across the globe and it becomes a commitment to promote the same.”