REPUBLIKA.CO.ID, JAKARTA -- Minister for State Enterprises (BUMN) Dahlan Iskan said it was almost impossible to bail out debt ridden state-owned Merpati Nusantara Airline (Merpati).

All available options to be tried earlier such as asset sales would no longer help , Dahlan said here on Thursday.

He said at least Rp15 trillion would be needed to restructure the airline including to repay a debt of around Rp7.6 trillion to 2,000 creditors and to settle unpaid salaries of its workers.

"And if we have Rp15 trillion we could establish three airline companies like Merpati," he said.

He said selling its subsidiary Merpati Maintenance Facilities to the state-owned asset management company PT Perusahaan Pengelola Aset would raise only around Rp300 billion.

No other asset was left to be sold , he said, adding, there are units of aircraft but they have been mortgaged to creditors.

Asked about the possibility of rescheduling repayment, Dahlan said rollover will need collateral.

"It is almost impossible as no asset that could be used as collateral," he said.

The debts of Merpati, which was established on 6 September 1962, has been restructure several times with injection of fund from the state budget.

Merpati was forced to stop serving most of its routes on 1 February 2014, because of financial problem.

There are a number of options to bail out Merpati such as through conversion of debt into shares (debt to equity swap), spin off of its subsidiary Merpati Maintenance Facilities (MMF) and Merpati Training Center (MTC), and joint operation scheme(KSO).

The partner in KSO must have capital, aircraft, both capital and aircraft and combination of capital, aircraft and pilots, he said.

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