A corporate leader with diverse experience, he is harnessing the latest technological advances to spur Malaysia Airports to greater heights as a smart aviation regional hub.
This month, Dato’ Mohd Shukrie Mohd Salleh remains confident riding out the storm despite the recovery movement control order (RMCO) being extended until year-end and recent spikes in the new corona virus (Covid-19) cases in Malaysia and globally. Optimistic of improved growth in the coming months as it works closely with the airline partners and other stakeholders to revive air travel and the tourism sector, the airport operator also enjoyed recent successes with its KLIA Crazy Sale held together with Tourism Malaysia’s Cuti- Cuti Malaysia Mini Travel Fair under the joint domestic tactical push strategy to spur the local economy. It was another feather in the cap for the KL International Airport (KLIA), underlining its versatility and creativity to meet the current challenges.
We anticipate passenger and which also flies to Penang from Singapore, Air. Meanwhile, our Turkish operations, ISGIA, aircraft movements gaining further momentum in the coming months given the aggressive fare promotions by our local carriers to various domestic destinations. Coupled with the packages from hoteliers and travel agents in order to meet the pent-up demand for travel after months of lockdown and staying at home, we expect to see domestic tourism continuing to take the lead.
The recent increase in flight frequencies has been partly fuelled by the commencement of Malaysia-Singapore’s Reciprocal Green Lane, which saw Malindo Air, Malaysia Airlines, AirAsia resuming their flights on 17 August to Singapore from KLIA. They were joined by their counterparts from Singapore, Silk Air, Scoot and Singapore Airlines. Scoot also made its presence felt again at our airports in Ipoh, Kuching and Penang while Jetstar Asia, which also flies to Penang from Singapore, has increased its twice weekly Singapore-Kuala Lumpur flights to four times a week from 16 September.
I am happy to report that our total network of 40 airports, including Istanbul Sabiha Gokcen International Airport (ISGIA), have surpassed the three million mark since the imposition of MCO in March to register 3.3 million passenger traffic in August. Of this, the domestic sector contributed the majority 2.8 million passenger traffic. In addition, Etihad Airways, catering for repatriation and transit flights, was the first among the 29 airlines operating at KLIA to resume daily flights as per pre-Covid 19 schedule that same month.
We also have two new routes from Kuala Lumpur to Kota Kinabalu and Kuching introduced by My Jet Xpress Airlines, a cargo freighter which is formerly known as Neptune Air. Meanwhile, our Turkish operations, ISGIA, had three foreign carriers – Pobeda Airlines, Jazeera Airways and Nile Air – resuming their daily, three times weekly and four times weekly flights respectively in August. All this adds up to the growth in both our passenger and aircraft trafiic.
Overwhelmed by the initial success of our joint partnership with Tourism Malaysia to boost domestic tourism and stimulate the economic activities at our inaugural six-day KLIA Crazy Sale, which we extended from 26 August until 5 September, we also had another one conducted from 25 to 30 September. While we remain fully committed to support our airline partners and retailers to recover from this pandemic together, we would like to remind our guests and shoppers that we are constantly ramping up the airport’s readiness to operate in the new normal and ensure high safety standards are maintained.