KUALA LUMPUR: The Public Accounts Committee (PAC) yesterday joined lawmakers and some aviation analysts in calling for the appointment of the members of the soon-to-be formed Malaysian Aviation Commission, including its executive chairman, to consist only of members who are truly independent.

“Our opinion is that members of the aviation commission must be totally independent of the industry that it is supposed to regulate.

“If the aviation commission is staffed by people from the airline industry, [and] we know that the government itself owns major stakes and controls, [through] MAHB (Malaysia Airports Holdings Bhd) and MAS (Malaysian Airline System Bhd) ... then the government is still not making the aviation commission independent,” PAC chairman Datuk Nur Jazlan Mohamed told reporters yesterday.

Nur Jazlan said PAC had tabled a report to Parliament on issues relating to the new low-cost carrier terminal klia2 in November last year, but that the government, to date, including the Ministry of Finance (MoF), had yet to act on its recommendations.

In that same report, the PAC recommended that the government set up an independent aviation commission.

“It (the aviation commission) is one of our recommendations that the government needs to look at even though it passed the bill last night (Wednesday night),” he said. 

“It is all in our PAC report, which states why we say that no connected persons to the airlines or even the government investment bodies should be sitting on the commission, it should be totally independent people,” stressed Nur Jazlan.

This is because the commission will be looking at the issue of the aviation industry as a whole, not just as a domestic issue but also an international one, he added.

“You need a pair of fresh eyes [for that],” he pointed out.

The bill for the establishment of the commission, The Malaysian Aviation Commission Bill 2015, was passed by Parliament just after midnight on Wednesday. It specified that the commission will be led by an executive chairman who shall be appointed by the prime minister. Its members will include two representatives from the federal government, namely the secretary-general of the Ministry of Transport, and the director-general of the Economic Planning Unit in the Prime Minister’s Department. The bill was passed while the second reading of three other bills was deferred to the next session following a heated exchange after Pakatan Rakyat Members of Parliament demanded more time for debate.

Bernama quoted Minister in the Prime Minister’s Department Datuk Seri Abdul Wahid Omar as saying that the soon-to-be-formed commission would ensure greater transparency in the Malaysian aviation industry.

Meanwhile, Nur Jazlan also urged the government not to ignore the PAC’s recommendations as it does not want to be labelled a toothless tiger as it is the voice of the people.

“Until today the government has not directed the Auditor-General to conduct an audit on klia2.

“But for 1MDB (1Malaysia Development Bhd), the government had instructed the Auditor-General to conduct an audit ... so why is it 1MDB was allowed and not klia2?” he asked.

This article first appeared in The Edge Financial Daily, on April 10, 2015.