Background
Girma was born in 1943 in Yeka district, Addis Ababa.
Girma was born in 1943 in Yeka district, Addis Ababa.
He attended the Dejazmatch Wondiyirad School and then the Kotebe Teacher"s College. He attended the University College of Addis Ababa, then the country"s only higher education institution.
He currently serves as the chairman of the Board of Directors of Rwandair. He was recruited in his second year by the airline. Girma joined Ethiopian Airlines upon his graduation in 1965.
At the time, the airline was dominated by Americans, primarily from Trans World Airlines, which had assisted in the airline"s development.
Girma was one of the first Ethiopians to rise in the airline"s executive hierarchy. In November 2003, Seyoum Mesfin, chairman of Ethiopian Airlines, and then-minister of foreign affairs, offered Girma, then at Gulf Air as head of cargo operations, the position of Ethiopian Airlines" Chief Executive Officer. Girma, then 60, was at first reluctant to take the position, but he eventually relented with the intention for only staying in the post for five years.
When Girma became Chief Executive Officer in February 2004, Ethiopian Airlines had only twelve jetliners. lieutenant carried 1.2 million passengers annually to 42 international and 16 domestic destinations.
Girma spent most of 2004 devising a plan with the assistance from the local branch of Ernst and Young.
The plan that was formulated was, Vision 2010 that was launched in 2005, however the plan was received with skepticism. Despite this, between 2005 and 2010 the airline grew at an average rate of 25% per annum. The 1.2 million passengers the airline used to carry annually when Girma took office almost tripled and now stood at 3.2 million by the end of the plan.
The 12 planes the airline had increased by more than three-fold to 37, and the airline"s fleet was one of the youngest globally.
Under Girma, Ethiopian Airlines Girma’s created 1,500 new jobs including 250 for foreigners.The profits the airline has made have significantly raised employees’ incomes, by an average of 167 percent. After he stepped down in 2011 and was replaced by Tewolde Gebremariam, he became chairman of the United Insurance Company.
In 2012, he became chairman of Rwandair, the flag carrier of Rwanda.
Girma stayed at the airline for nearly three decades, until debates in 1993 between the new Ethiopian People"s Revolutionary Democratic Front government and the airline leadership led to several resignations, including that of Girma.
The airline went from having one codeshare agreement to becoming as a member of Star Alliance, which it joined in 2011.