JEDDAH, 18 June 2003 — A Saudi group is planning to establish an airline to operate domestic flights in the Kingdom.
The move comes after the Cabinet endorsed a proposal to allow national companies to operate domestic flights, ending decades of monopoly by Saudi Arabian Airlines.
“We have been expecting this decision for quite a long time,” Nasser Aqeel Al-Tayyar, chairman of Al-Tayyar group, told Al-Madinah daily.
He said his company had conducted a feasibility study in association with Turkish, Indian and Singaporean firms.
“The project is economically feasible, especially at this time when the Kingdom is making progress in the tourism sector,” he said.
The opening of the Saudi aviation sector comes amid complaints by passengers the national carrier was not operating enough domestic flights and counter-claims by the airline it was making losses in the domestic market.
According to a report carried by Al-Watan newspaper, Al-Tayyar was seeking financial support from national and international banks to establish the new airline.
Al-Tayyar said the SEC decision would create fair competition between private airlines, offering better service to the public at competitive prices. “We have conducted a study on the type of aircraft to be used for domestic flights and how to get good aircraft at a low price so that we can offer competitive fares to passengers,” Al-Tayyar said.
The Al-Tayyar group charters some 300 flights annually from different parts of the Kingdom to Jeddah, Taif and Madinah, especially during the Haj and Umrah seasons.
Muhammad Al-Zeir, executive president of National Aviation Service (NAS), said his company was also planning to enter the domestic aviation sector. He described the Kingdom’s aviation market as the largest in the Middle East and outside Europe and America. “So investment in the sector is quite feasible,” he said.
However, he pointed out that the market would not support more than two airlines.
