Malaysia Airports Holdings Bhd (MAHB) announced the decline of its passenger movements through its system to only 137,000 passengers in accordance with the Movement Control Order (MCO), reported by 98.8% year-on-year last month.

The international sector decreased in April by 99.3%, while domestic passenger movements declined by 98.4% to just over 97,000 passengers.

MAHB reported that in  April traffic efficiency at Sabiha Gokcen International Airport (SGIA), both Malaysia and Istanbul, was affected by complete implementation of MCO in Malaysia and temporary suspension of Istanbul SGIA, following a decision by Turkish Government to close borders.

“The MCO enforcement in Malaysia has restricted airport and airline operations to repatriation and cargo flights.

"Since April 29, 2020, local airlines started flights to the key domestic routes in the midst of MCO, with airlines working together with airports to provide an safe, secure atmosphere and effective measures to guarantee a smooth and secure flight."it said.

The airport operator announced that over the previous 12-month period, the total movement of passengers by the MAHB system decreased by 10 percent to 121,6 million.

Overall aircraft movements contracted by 91.6 per cent with international and domestic aircraft movements diving by 92.9 per cent and 90.7 per cent, respectively, over April 2019.

MAHB has said that the MCO, which initially had been implementing multiple extensions for two weeks from 18 March, was now scheduled to end on 9 June.

Flights were initially restricted to repatriation operations, to and from international sector and on-going rescued Malaysians travellers to domestic sector.

"However, since the 29th April local airlines have resumed flights on key domestic airlines, ready for additional government-approved flights to allow more inter-State border movements with strict travel guidelines.

'The new Conditional MCO (CMCO) announcement of 4 May allowed nearly all businesses to proceed with strict rules on SOP,therefore, duty-free shops at our airports can restart their business,'it  said.

MAHB also claimed that it would be more important to improve safety measures and creative ways for travelers to reestablish trust through the technology approach.

“A new norm of traveling that would see additional processes, mask enforcement, and social distancing, among others, to ensure a safer travel experience is inevitable for the time being. moving forward.

“Malaysia Airports has taken advantage of the MCO to embark on upgrading its core network operating system as part of its digital transformation programme, which would also support other infrastructure enhancements and capacity developments to provide better process automation, augmented contactless self-service, robotics and biometrics technology,” it added.