MEXICO CITY (AP) — After nearly 4 1/2 years of trying, Mexico’s president said Thursday he has finally sold the unwanted presidential plane — to the former Soviet republic of Tajikistan.
President Andrés Manuel López Obrador said the Tajikistan government paid the equivalent of about $92 million for the Boeing 787 jet.
López Obrador refused to use the jet after taking office on December 1, 2018, saying it was too luxurious. The austerity-loving president usually takes commercial flights.
López Obrador had tried to persuade companies and business executives to buy the jet, but found no buyers. He even symbolically “raffle” the plane, which would be expensive to convert back into a normal plane.
The plane was bought for $200 million and used by the previous president, Enrique Peña Nieto.
It was a hard sell because it is configured to carry only 80 people and has a full presidential suite with its own bathroom. Experts said it would be costly to convert it into a typical airliner that could carry up to 300 passengers.
While the plane has relatively low mileage, Mexico has been eager to unload it because maintenance costs make it expensive to stay parked. There was talk of the Boeing 787 being turned over to a military-run company for use as a commercial airliner.
“After a long time, we managed to sell the plane,” López Obrador said in a video clip from the plane, which he had previously refused to board. “We are happy.”
“We are going to use the money from the sale of the plane to build two hospitals,” he said.
