KUALA LUMPUR: The tentative date for the official merger of the Civil Aviation Authority of Malaysia (CAAM) and Malaysian Aviation Commission (Mavcom) has been set and will be announced by the Transport Ministry.
CAAM chief executive officer Datuk Norazman Mahmud said the upcoming announcement follows the Parliament's green light for the merger of the country's aviation regulators in June this year.
"The Rang Undang-Undang has been approved by the Parliament but the effective date will be set by the Minister (of Transport).
"We already have a tentative date. The minister will announce the tentative date," he told the media at CAAM's media appreciation luncheon here today.
In June this year two bills to merge CAAM and Mavcom received the approval from the Parliament.
The bills include the Mavcom (Dissolution) Bill 2024 which was passed via a bloc vote while the CAAM (Amendment) Bill 2024 was passed via a majority voice vote.
The bills were tabled by Transport Minister Anthony Loke.
Loke said then that the merger of CAAM and Mavcom will see Malaysia having only one aviation regulator, which is CAAM as the country's aviation industry no longer needs two separate regulatory bodies to monitor the sector.
Norazman said CAAM will be a self-funded independent body after the merger is in effect.
The salary scale of CAAM, which is now based on the government's pay scale, will also be revised once the merger takes place.
"As it is now CAAM and Mavcom have already been doing all the business process engineering to synchronise all the processes so that we can see the industry better," he added.
Currently CAAM overseas the technical and safety aspect of the industry while Mavcom is responsible for the economic and commercial matters.
The government seeks to dissolve Mavcom and transfer all its powers, rights, duties, liabilities and obligations to CAAM under the Mavcom (Dissolution) Bill 2024.
All existing agreements, deeds, documents and other instruments to CAAM from Mavcom under the same bill as well.
The CAAM (Amendment) Bill 2024 is set to establish CAAM as the sole regulator for Malaysia's civil aviation industry.