Air Mauritius hosts partners to reception on inaugural return |05 July 2019
Guests being entertained by a dance performance during the reception
To commemorate the resumption of Air Mauritius flights to Seychelles on Tuesday, the company based in Mauritius and its general sales agent, Vision Voyage, hosted the tourism and travel trade to a reception at the Eden Bleu Hotel on that same evening.
Among the guests were the principal secretary for Civil Aviation, Ports and Marine, Alain Renaud; the chief executive of the Seychelles Civil Aviation Authority (SCAA), Garry Albert; the chief executive of the Seychelles Tourism Board (STB) Sherin Francis; the chairman of SCAA, Captain David Savy; and the general sales manager of Vision Voyages Franky Hetimier.
Addressing the guests, Air Mauritius’ senior manager sales and strategic cooperation, Ben Balasoupramanien, said it was great to be celebrating the return of Air Mauritius to Seychelles after 14 years. The last flight was in June 2005.
He said that Seychelles was now the 23rd destination in the Air Mauritius network and fifth in the Indian Ocean after Rodrigues, Madagascar and two points in Reunion Island.
Mr Balasoupramanien said the new destination will reinforce Air Mauritius’ regional service and will provide enhanced connectivity onto its global network. He further said that Seychelles and Mauritius are world class destinations but we share similar challenges such as the size of our home markets among others.
Mr Balasoupramanien further said that bringing our islands closer through better air connectivity is key to overcoming such challenges.
He noted that the first schedule of Air Mauritius - Seychelles service has been designed to optimise connecting possibilities for passengers through the Mauritius hub; these include the flock of business and leisure traffic to and from Madagascar, Reunion, South Africa, Australia and the Far East.
“Reinforcing air services between Mauritius and Seychelles offer the possibility to combine these two destinations into two centre holiday packages. Despite the numerous challenges with competition, rise in fuel cost, etc., Air Mauritius is committed to the Mauritian economy and the development of tourism,” Mr Balasoupramanien said, citing Air Mauritius’ investments in new airplanes with the latest technology for better travelling experience to the travelling guests.
Mr Balasoupramanien noted that Air Mauritius has already established working relationship with Air Seychelles, STB, hotel partners and travel agents so as to start promoting the two destinations on the offline and online markets.
Mr Hetimier from Vision Voyages told Seychelles NATION that the response has been overwhelming with queries and commitments from the Seychelles side since the announcement of the return of the Air Mauritius flight to Seychelles.
He said he was very happy with flight bookings being made so far from the Seychellois clients especially from the different promotional packages in place for the Indian Ocean games and Pope Francis’ visit to Mauritius with fares not exceeding R6000 for a limited time.
Mr Hetimier though said that the MK A319-100 flight with a seating capacity of 16 in the business class and 107 seats in the economy class, came with 33 passengers on the inaugural flight, with one passenger coming from as far as South Korea, and left with 17 passengers including 10 Seychellois on the return flight.
He said though that response is getting better day by day and the airline has already secured over fifty bookings for the month of August.
The airline will conduct a twice-weekly flight on Tuesdays and Fridays between Mauritius and Seychelles.The airline is based at Sir Seewoosagur Ramgoolam International Airport in the Mauritian capital Port-Louis.
A raffle draw was held for the invitees and the night’s prize for two return tickets to Mauritius was won by Eric Frost from SCAA.
The ceremony was spiced up with dance performances by students from the School of Dance.