KUALA LUMPUR: Malaysia Airports Holdings Bhd
’s (MAHB) network of airports sustained above nine million passenger movements for April 2023 despite the Ramadan period.
MAHB said the passenger traffic started to increase from the third week of April in conjunction with the Aidilfitri celebrations that fell on April 22, 2023.
"The nine million mark was first recorded in December 2022, which is generally the peak month of the year, and has since steadily recorded more than nine million passengers every month up to April 2023.
"International passenger movements remained above the four million mark, registering 4.3 million passengers in April 2023, reaching 76.8 per cent of April 2019 levels,” it said in a stock exchange filing.
MAHB said the domestic passenger movements registered 4.8 million passengers, reaching 78.4 per cent of April 2019 levels.
"Despite the Ramadan period in the first three weeks of April 2023, Malaysia’s passenger movements continued to record more than six million passenger movements, a volume that the airports have been steadily handling since December 2022.
"Both international and domestic sectors recorded encouraging weekly passenger trends, increasing by one-fold each week, driven by, among others, the Aidilfitri celebrations, flight resumptions of China Southern from Guangzhou to Kota Kinabalu International Airport and Air China from Beijing to Kuala Lumpur International Airport,” it added.
The airport operator’s Istanbul Sabiha Gökçen International Airport’s total passenger movements in April 2023 grew by 31.7 per cent over April 2022, registering 2.8 million passengers and reaching 93.8 per cent of 2019 levels.
"It is noteworthy that the international passenger movements recorded 1.5 million passengers for April 2023, this was the highest passenger volume handled in 2022 during the peak summer travel season and the highest for 2023 to date.
"Domestic passenger movements were encouraging as well, registering 1.3 million passengers, slightly higher compared to March,” it said. - Bernama
