WANTED: An investor for Zim airline

The Zimbabwean government has floated a tender seeking investors for its struggling airline, Air Zimbabwe.

"Tenders are hereby invited from interested parties to invest in Air Zimbabwe," reads the invitation, published on Monday.

The airline has a crippling debt of $377m, according to Transport and Infrastructural Development Minister Joel Biggie Matiza, who said in order to attract a partner, the southern African government would have to assume the debt.

"Currently, the debt is at $377m. Of this debt, however, $35m is foreign and $260m is government and state enterprises," said Matiza.

Engagements are already underway to warehouse the Air Zimbabwe debt, as government has approved the debt warehousing proposal, Matiza told a 2019 pre-budget seminar in Bulawayo on Friday.

Air Zimbabwe was, with effect from 4 October 2018, placed under reconstruction in a bid to revive its operations.

Only two out of its six planes are running.

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