Well can't comment on other Colombo, but i used Etihad the other day to London and back and the flight to AUH wasn't too busy maybe 80 or so in the cheap seats, and on the way back i guess it was 2/3 full, never saw the nice seats so can't tell, didn't seem a bad load for a newish route.
As for the CEO, if thats the german guy, you seem to be wide of the mark, they seem to like him very much, he had 100 million dollars to set up with and so far has spent less than a 1/4 of that, there expansion is restricted by aircraft, or the lack of.
