Solons hit cut in PAL flights to Taiwan

Congressmen belonging to the transportation and communications committee strongly criticized the move of Taiwan's aviation authorities last week to drastically curtail Philippine Airlines' flights to Taipei as a fresh air dispute between the two countries threatened to erupt into yet another full-blown crisis.

"What your government did was downright unfair and a slap in the face of the Philippines," Rep. Antonio Diaz (second district, Zambales), chair of a key transportation subcommittee, told Taiwan's chief representative in the country, Hsien Ching Chan, in a public hearing last Wednesday.

Diaz was referring to the unilateral action of Taiwan's Civil Aeronautics Administration (CAA) just hours earlier reducing PAL's operations from seven flights weekly between Manila and Taipei to four times weekly.

The subcommittee asked Chan to convey to his government the "extreme displeasure" of the Philippine Congress over Taipei's "unfriendly and discriminatory" act against the Philippines, and requested the Taiwanese diplomat to report back to the panel within 10 days.

Diaz had called the hearing to review the lessons spawned by the bitter five-month aviation dispute with Taiwan that was resolved only last Jan. 28, but was stunned to hear that a new problem had cropped up.

Under intense prodding from Diaz and subcommittee members Reps. Emilio Espinosa Jr., Federico Sandoval II and Carlos Padilla, Chan admitted that his government's move was in retaliation to the Philippine Civil Aeronautics Board's (CAB) deferral of China Airlines' request to mount additional flights over and above the allowable limit for Taiwanese carriers.

The CAB has thus far approved the applications of Taiwanese carriers China Airlines and EVA Airways to operate 10 weekly and seven weekly passenger flights, respectively, between Manila and Taipei, as well as thrice weekly all-cargo flights by both carriers on the same route.

The total of 17 weekly passenger flights by Taiwan's airlines, which deploy either Boeing 747-400 jets or high-capacity MD-11 aircraft, are enough to fill the 4,800-seat per-week ceiling stipulated by the Jan. 28 provisional agreement signed at Malacañang.

In contrast, PAL has originally received permission from Taiwan's CAA to fly seven times weekly between the two capitals, for a total capacity offering of 2,222 seats weekly. This frequency was scheduled to increase to 12 times weekly starting April 1, equivalent to 4,072 seats weekly -- well within the 4,800-seat limit for Philippine carriers.

PAL resumed services to Taipei only on Feb. 21 but two days later was forced to accept a frequency cutback to four flights weekly, which translates to only 1,200 seats.

The arbitrary order from the Taiwanese CAA, handed down just hours before the Taipei-bound PAL flight was due to take off from Manila, compelled the flag carrier to cancel its Feb. 23 service, causing inconvenience to the mostly OFW passengers.