[Arubalisa]

"Carnival Cruise returns/American Airlines
10 Aug, 2009, 09:05 (GMT -04:00)
http://www.amigoe.com/artman/publish/artikel_60798.php

ORANJESTAD — The Carnival Cruise Lines (CCL) intends to call in at Aruba again during the coming cruise season 2010-2011 and possibly in 2011-2012. This appears from a report of the meeting of the Deep South-delegation consisting of the Aruban and Curaçao port authorities and the shipping company on July 29th in the Miami-office of CCL.

In any case, the plan is to call in at Aruba sixteen times. In addition, the delegation did not receive a ‘negative response’ to the question whether the shipping company could and would guarantee year round calls, or if Carnival Cruise would visit Aruba throughout the entire year.

The news that CCL was returning, was announced after opposition party AVP reported their successful delegation to Miami to the press. The delegation-members negotiated with the shipping company as well as with American Airlines.

According to party-leader Mike Eman, Carnival also stated that they were open for additional visits, but ‘were waiting for a proposal of the – possibly new – government regarding the fuel matter’. The American cruise shipping company had also supposedly said that the Aruban government had never contacted them after they had announced in 2006 to drop Aruba as destination. Tourism-Minister Edison Briesen of government-party MEP considered this as lies. From the letter containing the conversation between APA and Carnival, it appears - according to the Minister, that the AVP-delegation wrongfully gives the impression that they had succeeded in getting Carnival Cruise to return to the island. For that matter, from the report of the Deep South-delegation it appears that Carnival is counting on a jump-start incentive for the sixteen calls, and that this applies for 2012 as well, if Aruba wants CCL to call in at the island. “Other islands offer incentives so that CCL will include their island again in its itinerary. The decision to return with sixteen calls is ‘definite and without incentive’, according to the Deep South-delegation.

In May 2006, Carnival decided to cross Aruba off their itinerary due to the high fuel costs. The ABC-islands are located the most southern of all islands called in by the shipping company. Furthermore, the company wanted to renew its route after five years. In spite of the fact that the cruise world is once again not doing that well due to the high fuel prices along with the economical crisis, Carnival says it still wants to call in at the Deep South of the Caribbean again. Meanwhile, the company has crossed off all of its cruises to European destinations, and wants to deploy all 22 ships to the Caribbean region.

It is not known, with which economical incentives the Aruban government wants to land the cruise company. It appears from the report of July 29th, that the delegation will come up with a package of facilities and present such to CCL before the end of this month.

American Airlines
AVP also spoke with airline company American Airlines (AA) in Miami, as this newspaper already reported earlier. During that conversation, AA expressed ‘strong criticism’ on the policy of the Oduber-government, says AVP-leader Eman. “AA is especially furious that the Aruban government offered all kinds of privileges to competitor Jet Blue. This in spite of the fact that American Airlines has been flying to Aruba for forty years.”

After this, the airline company had suspended eight flights from daughter company American Eagle, they never heard anything from the government on this, according to Eman. During his conversation with AA, Eman was informed that the airline company is considering starting flights again within short. The party-leader also states that AVP intends to negotiate with KLM to induce the Dutch airline company to include Aruba in their flight schedule. In addition, the opposition leader states that his party has continuous conversations with Valero. Relations with an eeb-trading partner, he says, are important for the future of Aruba. These relationships have either, considerably or entirely, been severed under the Oduber-government, according to Eman.

In the party-inclined-newspaper Solo di Pueblo, Minister Briesen published an email from the marketing manager of American Airlines, from which it appears that AA is satisfied with the Aruban government. According to him, numerous conversations were held in March with many airline companies on making appointments regarding flights to Aruba. It is not the case that nothing is being done on relations with important business partners, according to the Minister who accuses AVP of negativism."