On 9-7-2013 En Ahmad Jauhari Yahya (AJ), the CEO of MAS, has made an announcement that beside the additional route to Darwin, MAS will be reinstating the Dubai route on 1-9-2013, in HERE.
Was the above sudden announcement by AJ a relief to MAS staffs?
Most probably not because the MAS union, MASEU, spoke up against the management of MAS. On 18-7-2013 the Malaysia Airlines System Employees Union (Maseu) has called on the government to intervene in the administration of Malaysia Airlines System (MAS) by appointing new leaders in the airline industry to head the national airline, HERE.
On 5-7-2013 Mr Ignatious Ong, the CEO of Firefly, has also announced that Firefly will be taking delivery of another 20 aircraft from now to 2016. This was not in line with what had happened after the MAS-AirAsia share swap. See the press cutting below.
These decisions must have came as a big surprise not only to MAS and Firefly staffs but also the supporters of our national airline, MAS and its subsidiary Firefly. The said decisions had to be part of another “Turn Around Plan” No: ???? or “Spin Around”.
The background of the way in which MAS terminated Dubai and other routes, and Firefly terminated international and domestic routes had to be revisited in order to appreciate the why there were endless “Turn Around Plans”.
Every so-called “Turn Around Plan” cost huge sum of tax payers’ money and time to MAS.
For a quick example, MAS Dubai office had to be re-opened, embarked on new promotion exercise, recruiting of new staff and etc. The same for Firefly. MAS must have a proper in-dept study before rolling out its new “Turn around Plans”, which will only add to LEAKAGES.
We have heard from the top management of MAS on too many occasions about plugging leakages. One of the obvious is the 25 years one sided catering contract with LSG Skychef Brahim’s Sdn Bhd.
BRIEF BACKGROUND OF THE “TURN AROUND PLANS”
First and foremost, during the era of the then very powerful Minister of Finance II, Tan Sri Nor Mohamed Yakop, under the administration of Tun Abdullah Badawi, MAS was supposed to have been “saved” by the special “Turn Around Plans” known as the infamous “Wide Asset Un-Bundling” aka WAU, which was introduced in 2002 by none other than BinaFikir Sdn Bhd.
BinaFikir Sdn Bhd co-founded by Tan Sri Azman Mokhtar (Amok) and En Mohamed Rashdan Yusuf aka known as Danny (Rashdan). WAU was implemented with tremendous speed by Tan Sri Nor Mohamad Yakop and Tan Sri Md Nor Yusuf, the then CEO of MAS and now the chairman of MAS. Please read “How MAS was WAUed” and HERE.
In 2008 Maybank was so impressed with the superb performance of BinaFikir that it bought BinaFikir, a consultant firm of 6 years standing, for RM8 million!
Tan Sri Nor Mohamed Yakop has been in the limelight in the blogsphere of late. Please read HERE.
On 9-8-2011 Amok, the ex-BinaFikir founder together with Rashdan, made the sudden announcement that MAS-AirAsia to enter into a “Share Swap” agreement and the “Comprehensive Collaborative Framework” (CCF) which was purportedly to help MAS to “turn around”!
The said share swap did turn MAS upside down! Prior to 9-8-2011 no media knew about the said share swap except the news portal, The MalaysianInsider, which published a scoped story with clinical accuracy. We all should know why only the MalaysianInsider had the advanced story. Please read HERE, HERE.
The said share swap almost killed MAS with a stroke of a pen. If not for the YAB PM Datuk Seri Najib’s intervention, MAS would have been history. Incidentally, Dr Mohamadon Abdullah aka Dr Don has described the said share swap as a“National Tragedy”. Of course, this was said when he was not appointed as a director of MAS. Please read HERE.
A few days after 9-8-2011 we saw the sudden resignation of MAS CEO, YM Tengku Azmil. After YM Tengku Azmil’s resignation, MAS managed by the special EXCO.
The members of the EXCO were, of course, Tan Sri Tony Fernandes, Datuk Kamarudin Meranun both from AirAsia, and the BinaFikir’s whiz kid, Rashdan, the Khazanah‘s nominee.
Within a short span of about 1 month 16 days (from 9-8-2011 to 25-9-2011) the said EXCO was running “amok” in MAS. MAS was managed as though it was a privately owned company!
The EXCO was finally disbanded after En Ahmadd Jauhari Yahya (AJ) was appointed as CEO of MAS on 26-9-2011.
After the MAS-AirAsia share swap was sealed on 9-8-2011
In September 2011, Rashdan rushed to London to sign MAS sponsorship of QPR Football Club. The majority shareholder of QPR is Tan Sri Tony Fernandes. MAS sponsored the QPR jersey for home game only for two years. This sponsorship was signed when MAS was, of course, BLEEDING. It cost MAS almost RM9 million a year in HERE.
At the material time, several decisions that were detrimental to MAS and Firefly were made:
- Unilaterally cancelled numerous full load flights of Firefly during Hari Raya season recently thereby causing great inconveniences to the rakyat during festive occasion;
- Termination of profitable Firefly routes from Johor Baru to Kuching and Kota Kinabalu from 15 September 2011 also causing great inconvenience to the rakyat, who had to travel to KL to board the flights – not sure whether MAS or AirAsia flight;
- To change the name Firefly to Sapphire when Firefly is doing extremely well and expanding; and
- MAS signed Jersey Sponsorship Agreement with QPR, which Tony bought a few days after the secret share swap was sealed, when MAS was supposed to be ailing very badly financially.
Please read Rashdan: Bina Ada Fikirkah?
In January 2012, the consulting firm PlaneConsult was appointed by MAS. PlaneConsult has no experience in full service airline like MAS. Its experience centered around low cost airline.
Mr Connor McCarthy, an Irish man, is the chairman of PlaneConsult and he is also a director of AirAsia. Both AJ and Rashdan jointly appointed PlaneConsult as the consultant of MAS from 16-1-2012 to 30-4-2012, in HERE.
PlaneConsult was also the consultant of AirAsia, the key man in PlaneConsult is Mr Connor McCarthy, who is also a director of AirAsia. Read HERE.
Shane Nollan of PlaneConsult was appointed in November 2011 to be the Director of Sale for MAS, HERE.
Shane Nollan was helping MAS by ripping off the Malaysian Government in HERE.
During the height of the MAS-AirAsia share swap many questionable decisions were made including the million of Ringgit sponsorship of QPR by MAS, termination of Dubai, Bandung, Surabaya, Rome and other routes by MAS. Firefly terminated the profitable Johor/Kuching/KK, KK/Japan routes, sudden stopped of Firefly jet services, closing down of Firefly ticketing office in Kota Kinabalu and Kuching, closing down of MAS office in Dubai, Rome and other places, changing of the corporate colour/logo of MAS from red and blue to pale blue with the “wau”/kite in opposite direction, re-branding exercise, re-configuration of airbus A380. All the above decisions cost huge sum of money to MAS. At that material time, the nation was told time and time again by the top management of MAS that MAS was BLEEDING! Read HERE, HERE,
The announcement of New Business Plan of MAS where the top management of MAS was in great pain to justify the termination of several profitable routes like KL/ Dubai, KL/Bnadung, KL/Surabaya and etc in HERE.
After the termination of Bandung flight, AirAsia increased its to twice daily. Emirate increase its daily flight from 2 to 3 with the introduction of its A380 and from 3 to 4 daily.
When the top management of MAS terminated the Dubai route, rumour has it that AirAsia X applied to Dubai authority for it but it was rejected as Dubai authority did not want low cost airline to spoil the image of its airport. If this was true then AirAsia X and/or Tan Sri Tony Fernandes should thank AJ and the other members of the top management of MAS for all the kind helps rendered.
On 23-11-2012 Tan Sri Azman Mokhtar of Khazanah and 29-11-2013 AJ briefed the Public Account Committee (PAC) in Parliament House where AJ told PAC that Firefly was losing RM89 million HERE & HERE.
On 26-3-2012 Tan Sri Azman Mokhtar, Tan Sri Md Nor Yusuf (MAS chairman), Rashdan aka Danny, Rozman Omar (former CFO of MAS and AirAsia), AJ and accompanied by the former PM Tun Abdullah Badawi to brief MPs in Parliament House.
On 12-6-2012 AJ was seen to be defending Rashdan aka Danny in an e-mail where AJ stated among other things that Rashdan was “vilified and maligned in the blogspere”, HERE. Was AJ referring to the posting “The voyage report of the scandalous “Nanny” Danny” .
It must be reminded that the government had reserved an additional KL/Sydney route for MAS for the period 2012 to 2013. For reason best known to the top management of MAS, MAS gave up the KL/Sydney/KL route to, of course, AirAsia X. Will we be hearing soon that top management of MAS will be asking the Government for an additional route for the profitable KL/Sydney/KL route? May be this will be included in the next “Turn Around Plan” of MAS!
Was it not too late for the top management of MAS to reinstate Dubai route when Emirate has already stepped its frequencies for KL/Dubai/KL routes from 2 to 3 and then 4 daily?
When Dubai and other and other routes were cancelled by MAS and Firefly, who was top management of MAS wanted to help?
