KOTA KINABALU: The current location of the Kota Kinabalu International Airport (KKIA) is quite strategic and considered fair to all users from the North and South of Sabah.
Putatan UMNO Division Chief Jeffery Nor Mohamed said this is because the locality and existing connections to KKIA are very affordable for users to go to Kota Kinabalu who use taxi or e-hailing services.
“This is different if KKIA is relocated far away. Of course, it will burden users, especially the people of this state, who will face an increase in transport costs, to get to KKIA getting in addition to flight costs.
“I believe that KKIA now still has room to expand, especially with Terminal 2 which is not fully used,” he said, referring to the proposed relocation of KKIA to Kimanis.
Previously, the Chairman of Ghazanah Sabah Berhad (QSB) Datuk Dr Yusof Yacob, stated that the relocation of KKIA to Kimanis would take three to five years and the move requires careful planning.
QSB conducted a study and prepare a complete report to be presented to the Sabah State Economic Planning Unit (UPEN) before being brought to the state cabinet.
At the same time, Jeffery questioned whether a complete study of the complete study of passenger consumption quantity had been made or not.
“I consider it as one of the main conditions for the relocation to happen, especially when the existing airport can no longer fully accommodate the number of passengers using the airport.
“I was informed that KKIA has an average of 38 flights that take off and arrive every 12 minutes when compared to Heathrow airport in London, an airplane that takes off and arrives at an average of two minutes, while Singapore’s Changi airport every 4 minutes. It means that KKIA is still low in terms of flight frequency,” he explained.
Therefore, he considered the proposed relocation of the airport to be a good proposal “if the existing KKIA no longer meets the needs of its users”.
