Many of Al Baker's comments are spot on! Of course his reasons for speaking out are far from altruistic, and the same comments could someday be applicable to the ME3 as well. But for now the competition is definitely welcome, and should be encouraged.
Akbar Baker runs a competitive "cut-throat" business and will intimidate government, aircraft manufacturers, airlines to make his buck. Typical middle-eastern gun slinger!
There may be reasons to dislike a competitor, but assaulting a man's ethnic heritage sure is a weak argument.
the guy is a bit of a blowhard but I agree with most of what he is saying Emirates has been taking my business for granted and Skywards members got a recent "haircut" on their Skywards point totals. So I am near Gold status again with Qatar Airways (their Business Class might be better than EK but probably not their Economy) and I really like the new Doha Airport. And if you are booked on Qatar in Economy, they sometimes email you with an offer for a cut-rate Business Class seat but the offer is time-sensitive, good 18 or 24 hours On a recent Qatar connection I noticed they were selling some craft beers and a few decent wines, not too grossly over-priced, that you could buy at Duty Free if you were not entering Doha
In the meantime, the titans of commercial aviation took some time off to model their new socks. This festive occasion was a welcome break from their hard regimen of reducing seats pitch and devaluing their customer's mile accounts. Read more about their hard luck story here.
