KUCHING: This city will be connected to Jeddah and Medina in Saudi Arabia through direct flights beginning in the first quarter of 2023.
Tourism, Creative Industry and Performing Arts Minister Datuk Seri Abdul Karim Rahman Hamzah said the development came to motion after Sarawak Tourism Board (STB) signed a Memorandum of Agreement (MoA) on the Kuching Umrah Gateway (KUG) initiative on Oct 6 this year.
“With the direct flight from Kuching to Jeddah and Medina, we project more than 200,000 visitor arrivals within six years through KUG,” he said.
He said this in his ministerial winding-up speech at the State Legislative Assembly (DUN) sitting today (Nov 30).
Abdul Karim said visitors can enjoy direct flights to Jeddah or Medina, while feeder flights will be from Pontianak, Balikpapan, Banjarmasin, Samarinda, Ujung Padang (Makassar), Jakarta, Indonesia, Mindanao, and Philippines to support the mainline operations of the Umrah flight carries.
“Through this programme, travellers can fly from each respective location and stopover in Kuching for a pre or post tours before they fly direct to Jeddah or Medina, or on their journey home,” he said.
On a related note, he said the ministry is also working closely with the Sarawak Disaster Management Committee (SDMC) and the Ministry of Transport Sarawak (MOTS) to ensure flight frequencies are gradually increased to pre-pandemic level.
“Flight frequency to Sarawak has been approved by the Malaysia Aviation Commission (MAVCOM) at 587 flights per week into Sarawak, and only 408 flights are currently in operation by the airlines, and of the total, international and domestic flight frequencies are 35 and 373 respectively.
“At the moment, we have seven flights per week from Singapore to Kuching and three flights per week from Singapore to Miri through Scoot Airlines, while AirAsia has started its Singapore-Kuching flight 11 times a week, and Singapore-Miri five times a week, including the Singapore-Sibu flight four times a week starting Dec 16,” he said.
He added that the Royal Brunei Airline (RBA) resumed its flights to Kuching two times per week starting May 1, as for domestic flights, Firefly’s Penang-Kuching route is still at 14 flights per week with the inaugural flight on April 11, this year.
“In addition, AirAsia has increased its flight frequency from Kuala Lumpur to Kuching and Miri with 63 flights and 21 flights per week, Kota Kinabalu to Kuching with seven flights per week and also Kota Bharu to Kuching three flight week, while Malaysia Airlines (MAS) also fly from Johor Bahru to Kuching three times per week,” said Abdul Karim.
