AirAsia Bhd has dismissed reports that accuse the low cost carrier of making a decision not to move to the new airport, the Kuala Lumpur International Airport (KLIA2), which will be open for business in the month of April next year.
Jasmine Lee, Commercial Director of AirAsia Bhd, in shooting down these claims, said, “As AirAsia has no idea of not moving out of the current ‘packed’ airport, MAHB is the right party to clarify to the sources of the allegations. We do not know where it (the claims) came from. Even when we asked Tan Sri Tony Fernandes (AirAsia’s Chief Executive Officer) to comment on the allegation, he refused by saying MAHB is the right party to clarify as we have never made any recent remarks on KLIA2. At the end of the day, if we are not going to move to KLIA2, we do not have alternative airports.”
This comes as a reaction to an earlier response by MAHB Chairman, Tan Sri Dr Aris Othman, who said that since they’re only the service provider who provides the infrastructure, and that it’s up to the airline to decide whether they want to use their services or not.
With 50 percent of the new international terminal already constructed, it looks like only a matter of few months where airlines that currently operating at LLCT, mostly low cost carriers, will move to the new terminal.
The reason why this new terminal is being built is purely because of the issue of congestion that airlines are having to dealing with at the moment. In fact, with only a capacity of being able to handle 10 to 15 million per annum, the LCCT terminal is currently handling 18 million per year, and which is way above its limits.
Currently, the low cost carriers are operating in the cargo area of the LCCT, and soon will have to move anyways due to the requirement of expanding the cargo area as well. The Chairman also said earlier that the new LCCT is not just for AirAsia but for other low cost carriers as well.
Relations between AirAsia and the MAHB have worsened over the months, and this allegation adds a new twist to this ongoing spat between the two which first started ever since both organizations have had their differences over the high cost of building the new terminal.
Even though efforts have been made to resolve the situation, what still remains a matter of dispute is that the current location of the new location was not considered to be ideal by AirAsia, and this has resulted in costs ballooning to almost RM 3.9 billion.
What these high costs means for the low cost carrier (AirAsia) is that they will also have to pay a large premium for the services offered at the new terminal with chances of their charges being raised once they occupy the space at the airport that is built for them.
While the MAHB has complied with most of AirAsia’s requests, the requests that have ‘financial implications’ to them have been taken up with MAHB’s board of members for dicussion.
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