Toronto: Air Canada has announced its chief executive officer Michael Rousseau will retire later this year, after criticism of his English-only condolence message following this month’s fatal plane crash in New York.
Canada’s largest airline, based in French-speaking Quebec, said Monday that Rousseau had told the board he would leave at the end of the third quarter.
Canada is an officially bilingual nation, and Prime Minister Mark Carney had said the English-only message showed a lack of compassion and determination.
“We live proudly in a bilingual country and companies like Air Canada in particular have an obligation to always communicate in both official languages, regardless of the situation,” Carney told reporters.
Antoine Forest, one of the two pilots killed in the crash at LaGuardia Airport, was a French-speaking Quebecer. Forest and Mackenzie Gunther died on the Air Canada Jazz flight from Montreal collided with a fire truck on the runway shortly after landing on March 22.
Canada’s largest airline is headquartered in Montreal. Rousseau, 68, was once criticized for not speaking French.
He released his video message of condolence in English, apart from “bonjour” at the beginning and “merci” at the end, with French subtitles.
This caused an uproar in Quebec, where the National Assembly voted 92 to zero in favor of Rousseau’s resignation.
The Office of the Official Languages Commissioner also received hundreds of complaints about it.
“I am deeply disappointed that my inability to speak French has taken away from the family’s deep sorrow and the great resilience of the Air Canada staff, who have shown outstanding professionalism despite the events of the past few days,” Rousseau said in his statement last week.
“Despite many studies over several years, unfortunately, I still cannot express myself adequately in French. I apologize for this, but I continue my efforts to improve.”
Rousseau was paid C$13.1 million ($13.74 million) last year, according to the company’s latest regulatory filing.
Air Canada said the board has been working on succession planning for more than two years, and that in January it began an international external search.
“The board will consider a number of performance criteria in evaluating candidates including the ability to communicate in French,” the airline said.
Steven MacKinnon, Canada’s Minister of Transport, thanked Rousseau in a social media post and said the government will continue to work closely with Air Canada to ensure it “provides safe, reliable, affordable and bilingual service to all Canadians.”
Quebec Premier François Legault noted that when Rousseau was appointed president of the airline in February 2021, he promised to learn French.
In 2021, shortly after being appointed chief executive, Rousseau gave a speech to Montreal business leaders almost entirely in English. After the event, he expressed pride at being able to live in Montreal for more than a decade without speaking French, causing outrage in Quebec. He apologized then too.
Quebec’s identity has been controversial since the 1760s, when the British finished taking over what was then called New France. Quebec has about 80 percent French speaking population.
AP and Bloomberg
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