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TO the
rice, oil and other shortages lately, add the shortage
of seats in all airlines flying to the Middle East that
results in days of delays for at least a thousand
Filipinos going to work for the first time or returning
to their jobs in that region.
Six
Middle Eastern airlines serve the
Manila
to Middle East route, but they continue to be swamped by
the torrent of workers enroute to their home bases. The
problem had been steadily exacerbated after flag carrier
Philippine Airlines (PAL) suspended flights to the
Middle East some 10 years ago because of alleged unfair price dumping.
The six
Middle East (ME) carriers—Gulf Air, Saudia, Etihad,
Qatar, Kuwait, Emirates—are now asking the Civil
Aeronautics Board to allow them to increase their
flights from the current 50 a week, but the request
remains buried in legal wranglings, according to an
officer of the Airline Operators Council.
“This
[influx of workers] is a seasonal occurrence that
happens starting at the beginning of every year and well
into the middle of the year,” according to the
executive, who added the increase in volume of returning
and newly hired workers has compounded the problem.
“PAL
stopped flying to the Middle East in 1998 because it
could not match the lower fares offered by competitors,
who are heavily subsidized by their governments,”
according to Rolly Estabillo, vice president for
corporate communications.
He noted
that even big European airlines have ceased flying
direct from Manila to Europe because of the unfair
competition from the Middle East carriers.
There
are an estimated 2 million overseas Filipino workers (OFWs)
in Saudi Arabia alone, and at least a million more in
other nearby countries.
Estabillo said the Middle Eastern airlines have made it
their strategy to make the Gulf region a hub of their
operations so that no competitors could survive in
competition with their lower fares—made possible by the
subsidies of their respective governments.
He
pointed out that according to bilateral arrangement,
these ME airlines should, in return for their being
allowed to operate in the Philippines, provide the
country with hundreds of tourists from their region and
from other places where they operate.
“These
ME carriers have recently bought hundreds of new
wide-body airplanes but their aim is to fill these new
seats with OFWs, while forgetting to bring in the
tourists that should have been their contributions to
the routes that the CAB had granted them,” said
Estabillo.
He said
PAL had never been subsidized by government even from
its beginnings as a state airline, but had supported
itself entirely from its earnings.
The
airline council officer, meanwhile, said the ME carriers
have a pending request with the CAB to double their
current 50 flights-a-week capacity, but the board has
held in abeyance their request until PAL is granted the
same favor.
Last
month there was a Senate hearing presided over by Sen.
Juan Ponce Enrile, chairman of the Committee on Public
Safety, which is responsible for all forms of public
transportation.
Enrile
reportedly blamed the CAB and the Air Transportation
Office for the lack of seats because they did not give
in to the demands of the ME carriers.
In this
connection, a new Philippine carrier has applied with
the CAB to be allowed to fly to the ME to absorb these
vast number of OFWs unable to get seats in the six
airlines serving the route.
The new
air carrier—apparently a low-cost type—had proposed to
fly out of the Diosdado Macapagal International Airport.
Their application remains pending. |
