AIRPORT authorities must prove that klia2 is equal to KLIA in its facilities and services or they would have failed to justify the equalisation of Passenger Service Charge (PSC) between the two airports, DAP lawmaker Tony Pua said today.

He urged Malaysia Airports Holdings Bhd (MAHB) and the Malaysian Aviation Commission (Mavcom) to retract the decision to hike PSC charges for non-Asean international destinations at klia2 from RM50 to RM73, on par with KLIA.

Pua said klia2’s facilities and services were “vastly inferior to KLIA” as the former was “never intended, designed or built as an extended ‘second permanent terminal for KLIA’”.

“Klia2 was conceived and was always intended as an international hub for low-cost carriers, and was built to cope with the growth of AirAsia as the region’s fastest growing low-cost airline,” the Petaling Jaya Utara MP said in a statement.

“If MAHB and Mavcom insist on hiking the fees at klia2, then they must prove how klia2 is an equal to KLIA to angry Malaysians out there.

“If they fail to do so, then it cannot be clearer that the entire fee hike exercise is to make more profits for MAHB, particularly since MAHB has taken billions of ringgit in debt to fund its RM4 billion klia2 misadventure,” he said, referring to the high cost of klia2’s construction.

Mavcom yesterday told The Malaysian Insight that it was unsustainable for klia2 to stick to the PSC rates of the former Low-Cost Carrier Terminal (LCCT) as the new airport is more advanced and more costly to run.

But Pua said klia2 was relabelled a “hybrid terminal” in 2013, which made it unique and distinct from KLIA, due to cost overruns in building the airport.

Pua added that the International Civil Aviation Organisation (ICAO) allowed for fee differentiation between airports and terminals based on the availability and quality of services offered, and that MAHB was ignoring this guideline.

“The ICAO policy clearly states that in general, aircraft operators and other airport users, including end-users, should not be charged for facilities and services they do not use,” he said. – December 21, 2017