TAV CEO Sani Sener receives ‘medal of merits’ for Macedonia

Turkish company TAV Airports CEO&President Sani Sener received the ‘medal of merits’ for Macedonia by the President of Republic of Macedonia, Gjorge Ivanov this week at the President’s residency, Vila Vodno.
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The recognition is given for achieved results that contributed to significant development and affirmation of Republic of Macedonia in all areas of life and work, as well as for developing friendly relations between Republic of Macedonia and Republic of Turkey.

The festive ceremony at Vila Vodno was attended by numerous audience, including Turkey’s Ambassador in Skopje, Tülin Erkal Kara and TAV Macedonia managers.

Sener said: “I am truly honoured to receive the Medal of merits for Macedonia and I would like to express my great gratitude to President Ivanov and the Macedonian state. There are close historic and cultural ties between Turkey and Macedonia that date back centuries.

As TAV, we took over the operations of Skopje and Ohrid airports in 2010 and since invested approximately 120 million Euros to develop both airports. In eight years, the number of passengers at both airports increased by almost four times, to 2.3 million passengers in 2018. Number of destinations from Skopje Airport increased to 38 from 15 and the number of weekly flights between Istanbul and Skopje increased to 19 from four. The volume of trade between the two countries is around 500 million USD and Turkish companies have 1.2 billion USD worth of investments in Macedonia. I believe that the cooperation and the good relations between Turkey and Macedonia will continue to progress. I thank all our employees and our stakeholders for the success of Macedonian airports, which also contributes to the overall economic development of the country and believe that we will jointly celebrate many future successes with our friends in Macedonia.”

Sener is the first person from the business sector and the first representative from the foreign investors’ community at all, that receives the Medal of merits for Macedonia from the President Gjorge Ivanov. From 2009 until now, Ivanov has awarded 11 persons with the Medal of merits for Macedonia, mostly - diplomats, music composers, representative of sports teams, professors, engineers, representatives of the religious organizations and the Macedonian diaspora.