AirAsia boss Tony Fernandez has urged Putrajaya to focus its efforts on stemming the free-falling of the ringgit instead of stemming the free-flow of information on the Internet.

"I wish our government spends more time in fixing the Ringgit instead of blocking the internet," he said at an event in Kuala Lumpur.

"The people should be focusing on how to create more jobs and how to getting the economic going, this should be number one priority. I can't see anything more important than that," he said.

When asked if the political climate in the nation has caused the plummeting of the ringgit, he responded: "I think the political climate doesn't help."

Asked if a swift resolution to the 1MDB controversy would help the Ringgit bounce back, Fernandez refused comment.

AA outlook is good

For AirAsia, the current economic gloom has a silver lining as it expects inbound passengers to increase.

"We are a positive kind of company. We will use the weakening Ringgit to attract the people come to Malaysia. The sales is very strong actually," he said.

"Local outbound also strong, maybe people are running away from the economic problem and have holiday at Phuket and China."

Yesterday, Tourism and Culture Minister Nazri Abdul Aziz said that the weak ringgit was good for domestic tourism.

"Those people are mad, literally mad if they don't understand what I'm talking about," said Nazri yesterday.

"When our money is weak, do you go to London? Where do you spend your money? Port Dickson and Penang," the minister said.

Meanwhile, Fernandez refused to respond when asked if he or AirAsia would make a donation to any entities, if he knew the money would end up in a personal account.

"Thank you. Bye," said the billionaire.

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