There are those that believe that the flight attendants were the ones that caused Nationair to go bankrupt. Funny, considering they weren't the ones that started a lockout that even Obadia admits in reflection was a "strategic error". You'd almost think that they spent the 60 million he owed the Canadian government.

Obadia rambled on, on several occasions that

a. the flight attendant union
b. "certain" individuals (usually anglophone but always living in Ontario, Canada - francophone or not)*
c. Air Canada
d. union reps from Air Canada
e. the government
f. all of the above

assassinated the company. (No that wasn't a pop quiz)
He wrote a book afterwards in which he effectively blamed everyone but himself for the "assassination" of his company.

*This was one of the "lower" accusations that he would make. Using the "Anglophones from Ontario are trying to destroy Francophone jobs in Quebec" angle. Playing on the "language card" and angst that existed in Canada between Francophones and Anglophones, especially at that time. In fact, some of the persons accused would be Francophone, but because they lived in Ontario, that made them "the enemy".

They also claimed that the company books were off limits to them as the company was privately owned, and that they had 'no idea what was going on at the top levels of the company".
Good ol Bob said that the three men were disloyal, and that " they may want to give the impression that Nationair is sinking, but that is totally untrue."

The VP's that resigned said that Obadia was the only one that made decisions affecting the company. Thus, none of the above groups had any control over his decisions to skimp on aircraft parts, falsify documentation, create negative press or spend millions of dollars on a lockout with all the fixin's, rather than paying his taxes, insurance and other creditors.

Frankly, Nationair rarely paid a bill on time.

Many was the time we'd arrive at a crew hotel overseas only to be told that they were not going to check us in as Nationair hadn't paid their bills. Occasionally, the caterers (who provide food and drink on board) would tell us that their company wasn't very willing to go the extra mile for us, as the airline was behind in paying. Or they would refuse to cater until they were paid.

Nationair owed money to everyone. They even stiffed the parish in Quebec where crash memorial services where held.

By February of 1993, it had become public knowledge that Nationair owed millions in unpaid landing fees and taxes to the Canadian government. Somewhere in the neighborhood of 60 million dollars (Canadian). Both Canadian and Air Canada were livid, and demanded that if Nationair wasn't going to be paying landing fees and taxes, they wanted the same deal. That spurred some action.

Shortly thereafter, other creditors started demanding payment of outstanding accounts.

Fueling companies refused to give them fuel in foreign destinations, and one arranged to have an aircraft seized as a lien against Nationair. Several aircraft were seized in both Caribbean and European destinations, leaving passengers and crew stranded.

Captains started carrying cash on board to pay for fuel.

It then became known that third-party liability insurance hadn't been paid for, and IATA dropped Nationair as a member.