Former spy chief Michael Gichangi retires from Kenya Airways board

Michael Gichangi

Former director-general of the National Intelligence Service retired Major General Michael Gichangi. He has retired from KQ board.

Photo credit: File | Nation Media Group

Former spy chief, retired Major General Michael Gichangi, has exited the board of Kenya Airways after six years and eight months.

He was a non-executive director and the chair of the board’s the strategy and business development committee.

He joined the national carrier's board in September 2017.

“The company’s board of directors takes this opportunity to thank Major General (Rtd) Michael Gichangi, who has retired as a director at the AGM for his invaluable and immense contribution to the Company during his tenure as a board member,” KQ company secretary Habil Waswani said in a statement after the annual general meeting on Friday.

Maj-Gen Gichangi resigned as the director of the National Intelligence Service in 2014.

His appointment at KQ was in line with appointment of former top officials of security agencies to boards of parastatals and State-controlled firms.

The shareholders on Friday also adopted the resolution for appointment of Festus Wachira Kingori, a senior officer at the National Treasury, as non-executive director.

Last year, the airline narrowed its net loss by 40.7 percent to Sh22.69 billion, helped by a surge in revenues.

A string of losses has forced KQ to cling on to the Treasury for financial support bailouts that have attracted criticism even as the government mulls a way out for the airlines.

The National Treasury had earlier told the International Monetary Fund (IMF) that it expected KQ to get a strategic investor by the end of June 2024.

Concurrently, the government is also mulling the privatisation of KQ by merging it with other target companies and setting up a fund to manage them.

It remains unclear on the progress or lack of it on the two proposals.

PAYE Tax Calculator

Note: The results are not exact but very close to the actual.