Sabah to be the most favoured destination
Kota Kinabalu: Sabah will be “Malaysia’s Favourite Destination” at the Matta Fair in Kuala Lumpur from March 15-17 at the Putra World Trade Centre (PWTC). Sabah Tourism Board Senior Manager (Research Division), Angeline Engchuan, said Sabah Tourism Board (STB) would be in partnership with Matta (Malaysian Association of Tour and Travel Agents). As a marketing strategy for Domestic Market in 2019, it would be widely promoted through various platforms such as Matta’s website and media partner’s website as well as social media network, electronic and print media.
STB also proposed a partnership with Malaysia airlines for the Matta event during a meeting with the airline’s CEO, Capt Izah Ismail, on Monday. In this respect, Capt. Izham said, Malaysia Airlines will initiate a workshop on how to promote Sabah as a holiday destination. “STB will also collaborate with Malaysia Airlines overseas offices to promote Sabah,” said Angeline, adding that STB also proposed that Malaysia Airlines play a promo video on Sabah on domestic flights.
At the event Capt Izham said that the airline has not been flying a lot into Sabah since the MH370 incident in 2014 which went missing without a trace with some 300 passengers on board.
“To make matters worse, three months later, MH17 (shooting down of plane over Ukraine) happened. We were basically on our knees. The Government felt strongly that Malaysia needs a national carrier so we continued. “We don’t have assets that we wish we could fly, say KL-Sandakan five times a day. But KL-Tawau is booming. Even with those numbers, we don’t have the assets to fly a lot. We really have to position our assets at the most profitable route for us. We are taking away flights that are not making money but it is not easy to exit a route,” he said.
He said KL-KK, KL-Tokyo, KL-Incheon and KL-India are the profitable routes for MAB and hopes to “see sunshine” by 2020. Despite what happened, Malaysia Airlines is a perfectly safe airline, he said.
Source : Daily Express
