KUCHING: The Sarawak government is considering the idea of working together with several countries in setting up its own airline, says Minister of Tourism, Creative Industry and Performing Arts Dato Sri Abdul Karim Rahman Hamzah.
He said with Sarawak being an island, the fastest mode of connectivity is by air, and he is happy to note that the state government has been “able to manage the state financially well and coffers are shooting up very fast”.
“We are able to embark on things that we have never dreamt of before. We are setting up our own airline soon and hopefully with that airline, we can decide things on our own.
“There are many other things that the state has been embarking on which even the federal government is quite amazed.
“They (federal government) have to acknowledge that in certain matters, they are so far behind the state government like hydrogen and how we look at climate, so you can say that things are going the right way for us,” he told a press conference at Sarawak Cultural Village here Saturday.
Describing the airline, Abdul Karim said it would start regionally as it grows.
“It will grow bigger and I do hope that one day it will go very far – to Europe, Australia, Japan, Korea. In the meantime, we will start within Malaysia, Singapore, Brunei and Indonesia – just regional,” he said.
Abdul Karim also said that his ministry officials had just returned from a discussion in Jakarta with a subsidiary airline of Garuda, hoping that they will also be making connectivity to Sarawak.
“So, we will be doing as much as possible, not just with Indonesia but with other airlines including those from Vietnam and Thailand will also be doing something like that,” he added.
The Borneo Post
