AirAsia slams MAVCOM for 'micro-managing' industry

AirAsia has critised the Malaysian Aviation Commission (MAVCOM) for trying to "micro-manage the industry", saying that this will block the growth of the country's airlines. The low-cost carrier made the comment after MAVCOM put out a statement explaining that it had rejected AirAsia's application to raise frequencies on two routes due to overcapacity concerns. AirAsia was seeking more allocations for its four-times weekly Kuala Lumpur-Haikou and 25-times weekly Kota Kinabalu-Sandakan services. AirAsia said that the operation of international routes that are unrestricted in bilateral air agreements should not be blocked. "MAVCOM's decision to reject our route applications is therefore completely against the Open Skies policy advocated by the Ministry of Transport Malaysia when negotiating for bilateral air agreements with other countries." The carrier also reiterated its stance that the granting of route approvals should be handed back to the transport ministry.<br/>