Datuk Seri Dr Wee Ka Siong. -filepic
PETALING JAYA: Talks are ongoing with seven countries on resuming flight routes with Malaysia as the National Covid-19 Immunisation Programme has been rolled out, says Datuk Seri Dr Wee Ka Siong.
The Transport Minister said he had conveyed this to Airbus representatives who paid him a courtesy visit on Tuesday (April 6).
"We discussed the need to expedite the opening of borders with other countries in the post-pandemic era for airlines to recover as quickly as possible.
"I assured Airbus that Malaysia is in talks with seven countries in the region to restart flight routes during the current vaccine rollout and plan to announce developments in this area in due time," he said in a Facebook post.
Those who visited him were Airbus Asia-Pacific president Anand Stanley, vice-president and Malaysia country head Raymond Lim and special projects lead Nizamudin Abdul Majid.
"Airbus and Malaysia have a relationship spanning more than 40 years and I am proud to say that their presence in Malaysia is represented by all the multinational's business divisions, including customer services, helicopters, maintenance, and even defence and space.
"In fact, Malaysia hosts Airbus's only fully-owned maintenance, repair, and overhaul solutions centre in Sepang, the only one globally and which services aircraft from the world over," he said.
Anand, he added, had revealed that Malaysia's diversity, cost-competitiveness and a large pool of competent, skilled workers made it an attractive country for Airbus to set up its presence.
"With more than 4,000 staff members and suppliers working with Airbus in Malaysia, kudos to the company for partnering with many Malaysian-owned companies, including a company in Melaka which is, in fact, the world's largest supplier of composite parts to Airbus," he said.
