A decision in Lima to award TacaPeru a raft of routes to other Latin American cities and the USA has provoked a high-stakes dispute, including opposition from the administrators of former flag carrier AeroPeru, which is attempting a comeback after going into liquidisation last year.
Every other airline in Peru has appealed against the provisional award of routes to Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Costa Rica, Mexico, Panama and the USA. AeroPeru's administrators claim that the routes to Argentina, Brazil and Mexico were awarded to their airline as monopolies by the Peruvian congress and that the director-general of civil aviation (DGAC) had no authority to reallocate them by directive.
In any case, they argue, that these new awards should not affect AeroPeru's right to reclaim its old routes if and when the carrier resumes operations. Either way, the administrators claim that uncertainties caused by these awards have frightened some potential investors away from a rescue.
LanPeru and AeroContinente take a different view. They say the DGAC should not have awarded all the routes to TacaPeru without public hearings and findings when they had both formally applied for the same routes. The only response by the DGAC to these claims is an assurance that it will seek negotiations to change the bilaterals with Argentina, Brazil and Mexico from single to multiple designation, so that other Peruvian airlines can compete with TacaPeru.
Underlying these claims, which the parties are raising in court, is a struggle between two big Latin American players - Grupo Taca and LanChile - to achieve regional dominance.
El Salvador's Grupo Taca is already the key player in Central America. Through its 49% stake in TacaPeru, the carrier wants to expand southwards using Lima as a hub for routes spanning South America. TacaPeru's awards fit that strategy.
Conversely, LanChile's aim is to create subsidiaries in other parts of Latin America.
So far, LanPeru is its only example of this strategy, but LanChile was prepared to create an Argentinian equivalent before Buenos Aires blocked it, and has declared an interest in doing the same thing elsewhere.
The dispute over TacaPeru's new routes therefore has implications well beyond the borders of Peru.
Source: Airline Business
