MAS must be given every chance to succeed

THE B-word wasn't mentioned during last week's restructuring of Malaysia Airlines (MAS) but, for all intents and purposes, the beleaguered airline was declared bankrupt.

What else are we to make of a scheme that creates a new company (Newco) that will hold all the assets and some of the liabilities of the old firm, cut thousands of jobs, see renegotiation of old contracts? Still yet, a scheme that could see creditors taking haircuts or swapping debt for equity, and will need a single, overriding parliamentary act to push through some of the aforementioned changes?

Surgery can be drastic but it saves lives and MAS needs saving. On Thursday, it announced a loss of RM307 million (S$121 million), bringing the loss in 2014's first half to RM750 million. Since taking over the airline in 2001, Khazanah Nasional - its 69 per cent shareholder - has spent over RM7 billion on the company.