Kuala Lumpur: Malaysia has ruled out discussions with the Australian government regarding compensation for the families affected by the 1976 plane crash, which tragically claimed the lives of then Sabah Chief Minister Fuad Stephens and 10 others.
Transport Minister Anthony Loke clarified that the official report on the incident, known as the “Double Six” tragedy, conclusively attributed it to human error rather than any technical malfunction or deliberate sabotage.
”Therefore, the Ministry does not intend to engage in talks with the Australian government regarding compensation for the victims’ families,” he stated in a written parliamentary response to a question posed by Riduan Rubin (Independent-Tenom).
Last April, the Transport Ministry disclosed the declassified findings of the crash in compliance with a High Court order for the release of the investigation results.
The report, compiled by Malaysia’s civil aviation authorities, the Royal Malaysian Air Force and Australia’s Transport Department, concluded that there was no indication of sabotage, fire, or explosion.
According to the findings, the likely reason for the crash was “an aft centre of gravity position, causing the control column to exceed its forward range during the final approach for landing.”
Additionally, the report highlighted issues with the airline’s adherence to operational procedures and noted that the pilot had exceeded his duty period by 67 minutes.
Weeks after Malaysia declassified its crash report, Canberra followed suit with the declassification of an investigation report from the aircraft manufacturer, Government Aircraft Factories (GAF).
The GAF report revealed that the airline operated illegally as its operations manual draft had not been approved by the civil aviation department at the time.
Similar to Malaysia’s findings, the GAF report dismissed fire or sabotage as likely causes, attributing the incident preliminarily to overloading at the rear of the aircraft.
The crash claimed the lives of Fuad and 10 others, including state ministers Salleh Sulong, Chong Thien Vun, and Peter Mojuntin, occurred in Sembulan, Kota Kinabalu, just 53 days after Fuad took office.
