PENANG and Langkawi have both seen government initiatives to woo tourists but in recent years, one has moved way ahead of the other.

Penang is attracting more visitors compared to Langkawi.

The reason for this is simple, said Langkawi Businesses Association deputy president Issac Alexander. It is because Penang has better infrastructure, amenities, and government attention than Langkawi.

It wasn’t always this way. The country’s fourth prime minister Dr Mahathir Mohamad had taken a personal interest in Langkawi. He had wished to transform the island into a premier tourism destination after having served as a doctor in Langkawi. He saw its potential to become an idyllic getaway.

But it was the nation’s founding father and first prime minister Tunku Abdul Rahman Putra who first recognised this potential. He agreed to build on the island one of the country’s earliest resorts, the Langkawi Country Club, in 1973.

In 1989, Dr Mahathir declared Langkawi a duty-free haven, which made shopping on the island much cheaper.

He also brought investors who built many five-star properties and attractions, including shopping malls.

In the 1990s, it was reported that Langkawi drew a comparable number of tourists to Penang, said travel industry veteran Ahmad Pishol Isahak, who moved from Alor Setar to Langkawi in the 1990s.

He was a pioneer in the island’s travel sector and was instrumental in helping to bring to Langakwi charter flights from Finland in the 1990s to early 2000s.

“We might not have been a first-rate shopping haven but tourists then came to Langkawi for its scenic beaches and natural splendor. Penang was suffering then from a stretch of neglect.”

Langkawi was the first Unesco certified geo park in the region. Gunung Mat Chinchang is said to have the oldest rock fossils formation in the country – there is a myth that this was where Malaysia began.

In the 1990s to 2000s, while tourism thrived in Langkawi, Penang underwent a dull period as neglect and pollution seeped in to the extent that Dr Mahathir had called it a garbage state (Penang Darul Sampah).

But this began to change in 2008 when the state caught a second chance at tourism after its administrative capital George Town was declared a Unesco World Heritage Site.

Penang cleaned up as the city council worked to rebrand George Town.

The Unesco listing brought a new wave of tourists, both foreign and domestic, who were eager to learn about the colonial past of the island, while new hotels mushroomed in the state.

Penang Tourism and Creative Economy Committee chairman Wong Hon Wai said the state received nearly seven million air passengers last year, a 64% jump from 2022.

Meanwhile, Langkawi recorded 2.82 million arrivals last year.

What went wrong in Langkawi?

Pishol said a good portion of the seven million airline passengers to Penang could be corporate travellers, local families and civil servants.

He said Langkawi calculates its tourists by its ferry arrivals, which does not accurately measure tourists.

He said the calculations for tourist arrivals should instead take into account the guests at the hotels and other tourist lodgings.

But it is undeniable that Penang has more tourists than Langkawi, said Alexander.

Penang has a higher population base of 1.4 million while Langkawi has under 100,000 residents.

“It is not an apple-to-apple comparison. There are various mitigating factors.”

Penang has the North-South Expressway, two bridges, a cross-channel ferry service, and an airport, while Langkawi is connected only by ferry and airport.

Wong, as the Penang tourism exco, has been busy securing direct international flights and charters to the state since last year while in Kedah, the job is left to Lada and the Tourism, Arts and Culture Ministry (Motac)

Travel trade insider Eric R. Sinnaya said Motac had in the past left Langkawi to the leadership of Dr Mahathir, who oversaw the island during his decades as prime minister.

“Dr Mahathir was always keeping tabs on the island. This may have driven some quarters to become complacent,” said Sinnaya.

But when Dr Mahathir lost the Langwaki seat in the 2022 general election, the island lost its “godfather.”

Dr Mahathir had rebuked the islanders over his loss, calling them ungrateful for everything he had done for them.

Langkawi was slower than Penang to recover from the effects of the pandemic. Then came inflation, which drove up the prices of ferry and flight tickets, hotels, and food.

Siltation near the ferry terminals in Kuala Perlis, Kuala Kedah, and Kuah, caused trips to be scaled down.

Flight tickets to Langkawi were seen as pricey even though the island was serviced by the budget carriers of Air Asia and Fireflyz, Sinnaya noted.

Visitors were more attracted to Haadyai and Songkhla in Thailand, where prices had dropped. Those places lured a record number of Malaysians post-pandemic even though the Thai baht had appreciated against the ringgit.

Need for reinvention

Langkawi is now facing an acute shortage of water in some villages, and if that is not promptly addressed, it will impact tourism, said National Water Services Commission chairman Charles Santiago.

To complicate matters, a drought and heatwave has made Langkawi one of the hottest places in Malaysia, said Sinnaya.

“It is like another curse has descended on Langkawi,” he said, referring to the myth of Mahsuri.

Local legend has it that the island was cursed for seven generations by a young princess in the 17th century after she was wrongly accused of adultery and put to death.

Sinnaya said Langkawi could learn from Penang’s past and introduce a fast-track recovery plan.

He said that the island needs many new attractions and must no longer rely on its duty-free status to woo tourists. It must find ways to make travel to Langkawi more affordable.

The state and federal governments must work together to promote tourism, he added.

Conservationist Anthony Wong Kim Fei, who manages the Frangipani Resort in Langkawi, urged the island planners to go back to the basics.

The island’s tranquillity and natural wonders had sold well in the past,” Wong said.

For now, Langkawi is not doing too badly as five-star hotels are seeing high occupancy, said Alexander.

But there is always room for improvement for both Penang and Langkawi, he said. – May 16, 2024.