BANDAR SERI BEGAWAN, Sept. 25 (Xinhua) -- Foreign pilots at Royal Brunei Airlines (RB), Brunei's national carrier, have been retrenched as a result of excess pilot manpower due to the COVID-19 impact, a senior government official said.

According to local daily the Borneo Bulletin on Friday, Haji Mohd Amin Liew, Brunei's minister at the Prime Minister's Office and second minister of Finance and Economy, confirmed that RB is not flying as frequently as it used to, so it has the problem of excess manpower, especially at the pilot level.

"It is true that we are letting go of foreign pilots. This is something we didn't like to do but we are managing a business."

"We are seriously looking at cost management, so this sort of retrenchment is something inevitable. In fact we are seeing this in many countries in all airlines. But obviously that will not solve the problem, so we have to look at other cost-containment measures," the minister said.

"I think we all know that international travel will not come back any time soon," he was quoted as saying by the report.

The minister added that RB will continue to fly to Melbourne, Singapore, Kuala Lumpur, China's Hong Kong and Manila, with occasional flights to east China's Hangzhou, which are mainly dedicated to a certain group of people. Enditem

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