CJIA extends closure to May 1

The Ministry of Public Infrastructure (MoPI) on Tuesday evening announced that the Cheddi Jagan International Airport (CJIA) will remain closed until May 1, 2020. In a statement on its Facebook page, the Ministry said it apologizes for any inconvenience caused.

The Ministry initially closed the ports on March 19 to tackle the spread of the Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19). Guyanese stuck overseas are only allowed to return home following the approval of a ‘mercy request’ to the National COVID-19 Task Force.

See statement from the Ministry below. Included in the statement is an email sent to the Director of the Guyana Civil Aviation Authority (GCAA) from Minister of Public Infrastructure, David Patterson.

The Cheddi Jagan International Airport will be closed until May 1, 2020.

MoPI sincerely apologizes for any inconvenience this may cause.

Please see the email sent to Hon. Minister David Patterson from the Guyana Civil Aviation Authority confirming the airport’s closure.

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Good Morning Hon Minister Patterson,

Directive #GCAA/DGCA/2020-03 titled “Restriction of Flights within Georgetown Flight Information Region” which had an effective date of March 19th 2020 will expire on April 1st 2020. The implementation of this program with its few exceptions was very effective and assisted tremendously with slowing the spread of COVID-19 by limiting international contacts.

Both Regionally and Globally has seen tremendous increase in COVID-19 cases especially in the states which are traditionally the ports of origin for passengers to Guyana namely USA, Europe, Trinidad, Panama and Barbados.

The status of travel restrictions of our neighbors is:

Panama – Closed from Sunday, March 22 at 11:59 pm for 30 days.
Trinidad and Tobago closed its international borders completely from midnight Sunday (March 22) until April 30, 2020
Jamaica restricted its airspace movement from 11.59pm Saturday, March 21 for two weeks.
Except for Barbados, most of the countries in the regions have border restrictions in place at this time.

The World Health Organisation has stated that all passengers arriving from a known coronavirus destination must be subjected to mandatory fourteen (14) day quarantine.

With our initial fourteen days about to expire and with the lessons learnt together with the prevailing regional and global situation, I hereby propose that the Directive be extended for thirty (30) days after its expiration until May 1st 2020.