Jimmy Wong ('SIA is being competitive', July 28) has summarised the matter about SIA's advantages as compared with MAS', concisely and coherently. Unfortunately, transport minister Dr Ling Liong Sik has got it wrong again.

It is no secret that airfares vary from market to market. Case in point: MAS quotes very cheap airfares ex-Singapore (and via KL) to Australia and Europe, cheaper than SIA in its own home market! You only have to read the classified ads in the Singapore Straits Times to see this. Yet SIA is not complaining. In fact, MAS has a reputation among Singapore travel agents as being a 'budget' airline that relies on heavy discounting to fill its aircraft seats. MAS also discounts heavily on flights from Australia, cheaper than Qantas in its home market.

What Ling doesn't want to admit is that MAS has been comprehensively out-maneuvered and out-marketed by SIA, to the extent that Malaysians are willing to transit in Singapore's Changi Airport to take an SIA flight to the US, Europe or Australia.

And for this, the previous MAS management is to blame. Forget about MAS losing money on its domestic operations. I would suggest that if the auditors really tore MAS' books apart, they would find that its international operations are not in that great shape either.

In perspective, MAS (and by extension the government) did almost everything wrong.

MAS dragged its feet in entering into one of the global airline alliances, to the extent that it is no more a desirable or sought-after partner. Its key competitors in the region - SIA, Cathay and Thai are all members of one or another alliance.

MAS did not extend its routes to the US and Canada, in spite of the open skies agreement between Malaysia and the US. MAS only flies to Los Angeles and New York (Newark Airport) and has no flights to Canada.

SIA flies to Los Angeles, San Francisco and New York (both Newark and Kennedy Airports) and from Aug 1 starts flights to Chicago. In Canada, it flies to Vancouver and has plans to start flights to Toronto. It's simple logic - the more Americans fly into Singapore, the more US airlines will want to fly into Singapore too.

MAS allowed its image and inflight service to deteriorate. Witness how MAS has fared in the rankings of Asia-Pacific airlines, a fact that both MAS and the government have been careful not to publicise.

The government did not have a clue as to how the new KLIA was to be marketed as an international hub, to the point that Hong Kong, Bangkok and Singapore have taken insurmountable leads over KL as international air transportation hubs (both for passengers and cargo).

But the transport minister will never admit to any or all of the above. It is easier for him to fudge the issues by raising the canard of unfair competition from SIA. Unfortunately, the traveling public, businessmen, international investors and fund managers know better. Which is why MAS faces a long, hard struggle to rehabilitate itself.