CemAir has taken advantage of the “new normal” aviation landscape in South Africa and is going from strength to strength. Since their return to service in June 2020, they have grown their domestic route network from their regional centres of Plettenberg Bay, Margate and George to more of the more major routes, including two of the busiest routes in SA, Cape Town – Johannesburg and Johannesburg – Durban.
CemAir has always made an effort to service popular tourist destinations and important business towns across Africa on both scheduled and non-scheduled flights. Their ever-growing fleet of CRJ’s, Dash 8’s and Beech 1900D’s will be joined by the first lager type later this year, it is expected that the new arrival will be from the Airbus A320 stable.
CemAir has formed partnerships with several major continentals and international airlines operating to South Africa, the latest of which is ProFlight Zambia and Qatar Airways.
The agreement with ProFlight combines the two Carriers route networks between and within South Africa and Zambia providing travellers with a seamless travel experience. CemAir and ProFlight intend to operate as both an interline and a codeshare under the new agreement.
The initiative will enable travel on a single ticket between the two airlines’ fifteen destinations which include Johannesburg, Cape Town, George and others with CemAir and Lusaka, Ndola, Livingstone, Mfuwe and Solwezi in the ProFlight network.
Miles van der Molen, CEO of CemAir, stated “The code-share agreement is the logical next step in our long partnership with ProFlight. This will give convenience and value to customers linking businesses and people of Zambia and South Africa.” he continued “We are delighted to have implemented this significant integration. Zambia is an important market and ProFlight has an impressive and extensive footprint in the country.”
Tony Irwin, Managing Director of ProFlight Zambia added, “Customers needs are at the heart of this joint venture with CemAir, where additional destinations, more flights and unrivalled customer service will reinforce our position as Zambia’sfavourite and preferred airline.
ProFlight Zambia was established in 1991 and is Zambia’s leading scheduled airline. From its base in Lusaka, its domestic routes include Livingstone, Mfuwe, Ndola and Solwezi, regionally to Johannesburg.
A similar agreement was recently announced between CemAir and Qatar Airways. The agreement will allow passengers seamless travel between points in the carriers two networks with the convenience of a single ticket and at a significantly lower cost.
Qatar Airways Vice President Africa, Mr Hendrik Du Preez, said: “We are delighted to sign the interline agreement with CemAir, connecting our passengers to 16 additional domestic and four regional destinations from South Africa. We are proud to be the leading international carrier connecting South Africa with Asia-Pacific, Europe, the Middle East and the U.S., offering more flexible travel options and a global network of flights that passengers, trade and business partners can rely on. South Africa has always been a very important market to us and we continue to demonstrate our commitment to the region by strengthening partnerships with local carriers and steadily increasing South Africa frequencies.”
“We are proud of our association with Qatar Airways, one of the world’s leading airlines,” said Miles van der Molen “Qatar Airways is a strong partner and with the significant changes in the South African airline industry, we look forward to working with Qatar Airways.
A multiple award-winning airlines, Qatar Airways was named ‘World’s Best Airline’ by the 2019 World Airline Awards, managed by Skytrax. It was also named ‘Best Airline in the Middle East’, ‘World’s Best Business Class’, and ‘Best Business Class Seat’, in recognition of its ground-breaking Business Class Experience, Qsuite. The Qsuite seat layout is a 1-2-1 configuration, providing passengers with the most spacious, fully private, comfortable and social distanced Business Class product in the sky. Qsuite is available on flights to more than 45 destinations including Johannesburg, Maldives, Riyadh and Singapore. It is the only airline to have been awarded the coveted ‘Skytrax Airline of the Year’ title, which is recognised as the pinnacle of excellence in the airline industry, five times.
Qatar Airways plan operates 26 weekly flights to three key destinations in South Africa; Cape Town, Durban and Johannesburg. The airline operates over 100 weekly flights to and from 23 African destinations operated by a mix of the airline’s modern fuel-efficient Airbus A350 and Boeing 787 aircraft which will significantly increase the reach of CemAir passengers with minimal effort.
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