Air route award to a China Airlines' subsidiary attacked

A KMT lawmaker criticized the Civil Aeronautics Administration (CAA) yesterday for allowing Mandarin Airlines, a China Airlines (CAL, 華航) subsidiary, to share the lucrative Taiwan-Hong Kong air route.

Legislator Chi Kuo-tung (紀國棟) said at a news conference that allowing Mandarin Airlines to operate flights to Hong Kong is a boon to CAL, which controls a 90.05 percent stake in Mandarin Airlines.

"Is this arrangement fair?" Chi asked, referring to China Airlines' poor flight safety record. "Nobody in the government has assumed responsibility for the latest CAL crash which claimed 225 lives, and now the CAA has even allowed the carrier's subsidiary to fly the `golden route.' How can the CAA justify its decision?"

A China Airlines Boeing 747-200 jetliner crashed into the Taiwan Strait near Penghu en route to Hong Kong May 25, killing all 225 passengers and crew aboard. It was the fourth major fatal mishap involving one of the airline's planes in eight years.

"For an air carrier with such a poor safety record, CAL has not been punished by the CAA and has instead been rewarded by having its offshoot receive the hotly-contested rights to the Taiwan-Hong Kong route," Chi lamented, adding that CAA Director-General Chang Kuo-cheng (張國政) should step down to take the blame for the unfair and unreasonable allocation of the rights to fly the Taiwan-Hong Kong route.

Several representatives of the bereaved victims' families of the May 25 CAL crash were present at the news conference and backed Chi's call for Chang's resignation, over what they said was an unfair "Taiwan-Hong Kong aviation rights allocation."

Taiwan and Hong Kong signed a new five-year aviation agreement in Taipei on June 29 under which Mandarin Airlines and Hong Kong's Air Hong Kong, a wholly owned subsidiary of Cathay Pacific Airways, will join Taiwan-Hong Kong flight services for the first time.

The new accord allows EVA Airways to add 33 passenger flights per week, while Mandarin Airlines will obtain 16 new passenger flights. These 16 flights had been slated for China Airlines before the May 25 crash. According to international aviation regulations, carriers involved in fatal flight accidents cannot obtain new flights within a year. As a result, China Airlines will continue to operate 100 passenger flights, while the number of EVA's weekly flights will increase from the current 21 to 54.