~ Invoices were not paid for 6 months, while invoices and emails were ignored. ~
PHILIPSBURG:--- Winward Islands Airways International NV (WINAIR) Chief Executive Officer Michael Cleaver and Chief Financial Officer Roberto Gibbs are now trying to avoid court litigations for non-payment of its invoices to Aubin Handling Company while no effort was made to pay the Air Traffic fees to St Barths Airport since March 2020.
WINAIR did not pay any of its bills at least to Aubin Handling and St. Barths Airport since March 2020 and has been hiding behind the COVID-19 pandemic.
Sure, enough all airlines and other businesses suffered due to the COVID-19 pandemic, but St. Maarten did not shut down its operations at the airport on March 1st, 2020. Besides that, many companies managed to pay their bills for the first month or two but in the case of WINAIR, they ignored their bills and ran to the shareholder representatives for help while they are also receiving SSRP payroll support.
The Prime Minister of St. Maarten Silveria Jacobs confirmed that WINAIR approached the government for financial assistance but government was unable to assist the government-owned company with liquid cash.
In 2017 WINAIR posted a net profit of $3.8 million, this was based on their independent audit report for 2016 which made the company’s Supervisory Board of Directors excited based on a press release issued by WINAIR.
Based on documentation SMN News received WINAIR owed Aubin Handling for services they provide from March to August 2020, the company also granted WINAIR a 30% discount WINAIR requested yet management did not see it fit to even communicate with the vendors they owe until they were given until Monday, October 19th, 2020 to settle their debts before legal action is taken. The company clearly informed WINAIR that they will not entertain meetings with WINAIR unless its outstanding bills are being paid since the invoices that were sent to them each month were not challenged.
Moreover, WINAIR’s CFO Roberto Gibbs in email communication to the company felt their debts and obligations to the French companies should be written off because he is of the opinion that the French government injected money into all companies within the French territories during the lockdown and will continue to do so until the end of 2020 to mitigate its financial effects.
It should be noted that St. Barthélemy is one of WINAIR’s premium destinations that one would think the company would treat with the utmost care during this pandemic.
WINAIR transports close to 70,000 passengers per year to St. Barthelemy where the lowest fares are around $350.00 round trip. Therefore, a rough estimation shows that they make about 24,500,000 annually yet the companies that service WINAIR in St. Barthelemy could not be paid unless they threaten to sue WINAIR in French courts.
Bear in mind that WINAIR services several Caribbean and other destinations whom they also owe. The other destinations are for commercial and chartered flights are as follows.
• Antigua
• Aruba
• Bonaire
• Curacao
• Dominica
• Guadeloupe
• Haiti
• Nevis
• Saba
• San Juan Puerto Rico
• Santo Domingo
• St Eustatius
• St Kitts and Nevis
• Tortola
Travelers could also charter WINAIR’s aircraft to any of the destinations they fly, and since they got a clean audit report and managed to post a hefty profit for 2016, one would also assume they had managed fairly well in 2017, 2018, and in 2019. It is expected that WINAIR will use hurricane Irma to say they did not break even. Even if that is the case, WINAIR should cut the salaries and perks of its executives and ensure that services granted by the company are paid for instead of loafing off on other businesses and countries.
While WINAIR rushed to government for financial assistance and did not get any cash, they still managed to pay half of what they owed to Aubin on Friday, October 16th while they have until Monday, October 19th to pay the other half.
The question that comes to mind is where did they fork out the money from to make the payment on Friday while not showing any interest for 6 months? Is this the way the company operates based on corporate governance and good business ethics and practices?
Most importantly would anyone have accepted such behavior from any of the local executives from the other government-owned companies such as Princess Juliana International Airport, Ports St. Maarten, Telem Group of Companies, or even GEBE?
Seemingly the shareholder is only using microscopic lenses to gaze at locals that are at the helm of the other government-owned companies while at WINAIR gets a free pass even though two of the executives are imported and whatever they do go unnoticed.
The Parliament of St. Maarten is charged with overlooking government and how they handle the affairs of the country, over the past year PJIAE and its executives had to report to Parliament several times while not one word was mentioned by these Parliamentarians about WINAIR thus far.
SMN News sent an email with several questions to the CEO of WINAIR on Friday to which none of the questions were answered. CEO Michael Cleaver does not believe he has any obligations to answer questions posed to him by the media or to even provide answers to the taxpayers on St. Maarten that are part owners of the airline.
The questions posed are the following.
1. When was the last time WINAIR paid St. Barths Airport for its airport fees for the year 2020? If payment was made can you provide proof of payment? If not, can you provide the exact figures owed to St. Barths Airport.
2. Does WINAIR have an outstanding amount for AUBIN Handling company. If so, how much, and when does WINAIR intend to make payments.
3. Is St. Barths considering a premium hub for WINAIR and can the company afford to lose the destination due to non-payment of relevant fees for services provided?
4. How much money have WINAIR collected from the SSRP since March 2020 and exactly for what?
5. Have WINAIR been collecting rental fees from everyone that uses WINAIR hanger for private aircraft, especially from former board members? Do these aircraft owners pay WINAIR for the services it provides such as servicing.?
6. Did the management of the WINAIR applied the 12.5% salary cut as demanded by the Dutch Government? If so, can you provide proof of this cut applied to members of the management team? Especially your salary MR. CLEAVER and MR. ROBERTO GIBBS.
WINAIR Chief Executive Officer Michael Cleaver has a salary that exceeds $20,000.00 monthly, he also gets house, car, and telephone allowance along with other perks. One would think that the company would have scaled down the salaries for its high paying executives in order to safeguard the company especially since the Dutch government made it mandatory for cuts to be made at governments level and within government-owned companies before St. Maarten could get financial assistance from the Dutch Government. Even that question Cleaver did not answer even though Prime Minister Silveria Jacobs said on Wednesday that they had agreed to make the cuts when they met with the shareholder, the Council of Ministers.
It is rumored that WINAIR allows certain persons within the community use WINAIR’s hanger at PJIAE free of costs for their private aircraft, employees of the company said that these persons are friends of management that even get other free services from the government-owned company, SMN News asked Cleaver about that too and he also refused to answer the question saying the company only have to provide answers to the shareholder representatives and possibly the Dutch government.
Hopefully, the government of St. Maarten is making sure that the dividends for the shareholder are being paid because it is clear that the company funds are disappearing while vendors are not being paid and the common workers at WINAIR are not the ones benefitting.
Bear in mind all of the above takes place under the watchful eyes of the Supervisory Board of Directors chaired by George Greaux.
