The National Union of Flight Attendants Malaysia (Nufam) has cautioned Finance Minister Tengku Zafrul Abdul Aziz that he should investigate the source of the national airline carrier's huge losses before more funds are pumped in.
"While Nufam applauds the government's move to help the ailing national carrier out of its crisis, we do not want the airline to abuse taxpayers money since Malaysia Airlines Berhad (MAS) has already lost billions of ringgit pre-Covid-19.
"We have raised these issues before with the last government and we are asking the present government to do the same again," said the Nufam secretariat in a statement today.
The union was responding to Zafrul's announcement that MAS' sole shareholder Khazanah Nasional has been told to put the airline in a "position of strength" to support the domestic economy after the Covid-19 pandemic.
"The Finance Ministry has spoken to Khazanah and asked them to ensure that MAS continues to be in the position of strength to support the economy when it recovers," Zafrul (photo) told Nikkei Asia in a recent interview.
Last month, MAS announced negotiations over restructuring RM16 billion ($3.9 billion) of debt. A failed negotiation could result in the winding up of the 73-year-old airline, said CEO Izham Ismail.
"Khazanah, being the big government-linked investment company, has the resources to ensure that MAS (can) survive and hopefully use this crisis as an opportunity to rebuild the airline industry, and of course MAS," said Zafrul, calling on critics to remain positive on MAS, saying it was a symbol of national identity that all Malaysians can take pride in.
Nufam said it wants due diligence to be carried out before more money is squandered.
"We certainly thank the government for their support in reviving the airline industry and to offer help to the affected industry workers but we want them to look seriously into those issues of huge losses.
"There are accountability issues here and therefore, as a union, we are raising the red flag now," said the secretariat.
"There were many demands by the general public calling for the management to step down due to the airline's continuous poor performance.
"The public is also blaming the government for ignoring these huge losses and continue to fund unnecessarily a loss-making national airline while paying top salaries to the same team of people to manage the national assets and worker's welfare.
"It's unfair if the government were to keep pumping in more money but the airline continues to maintain the same people who have caused losses in the past years," it said.
Nufam also alleged abuse of power by the top-level management against low ranking workers, claiming that many were retrenched or asked to leave first. - Mkini
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