AirAsia commercial director Jasmine Lee told The Malaysian Insider MAHB also forced airline staff to remove “Say No To Airport Tax Increase” stickers from their uniform and allegedly confiscated security tags from some of its groundcrew.
AirAsia passengers were not spared either, with the airport operator allegedly threatening to bar them from flying if they did not remove the offending stickers from their boarding passes or clothes, she said.
MAHB staff involved in the confrontation, which began at 10.00am today and lasted until lunchtime, were reportedly accompanied by auxiliary police officers in some instances.
“Our legal team will be sending them a letter today to inform them that they do not have the right to harrass our staff,” Lee said, pointing out that the stickers made no mention of MAHB.
Lee added that AirAsia would resume their sticker campaign tomorrow despite what happened this morning.
AirAsia CEO Fernandes earlier likened MAHB’s clampdown on the anti-tax hike campaign to the actions of a “police state” on micro-blogging site Twitter.
“Malaysian airport staff tearing down our posters and taking away airport passes of our staff. And using intimidation. Can someone tell them this is Malaysia and not a police state,” he said.
But MAHB senior general manager for operations Datuk Azmi Murad denied any claims of intimidation, saying that no passes were revoked and that no posters were allowed on airport property without authorisation.
Azmi pointed out that AirAsia staff had been putting up anti-tax hike posters in public areas of the LCCT, including in lifts, and airport staff took them down as a matter of policy and was not targetting AirAsia specifically.
“Anyone who puts up posters in the terminal building we will remove,” he said.
“Imagine any Tom, Dick or Harry being able to come and putting up posters all over public areas. Anybody’s posters will be taken down.”
Azmi also said that while security did check AirAsia staff for valid passes for entry into restricted areas of the airport, none were revoked.
MAHB viewed the campaign against the airport tax hike as a protest against the government’s decision and not against MAHB, he added.
As part of the airline’s anti-tax hike campaign, customers who tried to book flights via the AirAsia website were greeted with a pop-up message asking them to oppose the tax increase.
“This is just too petty,” said one customer who tried to book a flight today. “There has to be a better way to deal with it. It could have been done in a more dignified manner.”
The customer, who asked not to be identified, said the pop-up was not effective enough to make him write in to protest the tax hike.
The Transport Ministry recently gave MAHB the green light to raise passenger service charges by 28 per cent and aircraft parking and landing charges by nine and 18 per cent respectively over three years.
Airport taxes at Penang, Kuching and Langkawi will rise to RM65 from RM51, and to RM32 from RM25 at low-cost carrier terminals (LCCTs) in Sepang and Kota Kinabalu.
An agreement signed between MAHB and the Transport Ministry in February 2009 set a benchmark airport tax rate of RM65, excluding LCCTs, with the government compensating the airport operator for any difference.
AirAsia has questioned whether the increases were justified based on the quality of the terminals, but MAHB has maintained its airport charges were already the lowest in the region.
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