Nigerian pilots, many of whom are unemployed, are losing out on opportunities created by politicians, especially presidential hopefuls, as they opt for expatriates over local pilots for state-to-state campaigns on their private jets.
BusinessDay’s findings show that most politicians with private jets have already employed expatriates to fly them for their political rallies while over 60 percent of young Nigerian pilots are still in search of jobs.
Isa Simon, a captain who has worked for airlines and corporate jet operators, confirmed the development to BusinessDay, saying some of the presidential hopefuls who own private jets or leased them for their use engaged foreigners to fly and cater for the aircraft.
According to Simon, the foreign pilots are paid handsomely in US dollars, accommodated, fed and transported to work. “Most of them have some form of work rotation and the owners of those jets buy them tickets for them to go home and come back to Nigeria after rotation, and during their time away from rotation, they are still paid salaries,” he said.
“Usually, people that own private jets are powerful people in the society and when they say I don’t want a Nigerian pilot, who are you to fault their decisions,” he added.
Simon said the development would impact the aviation sector and Nigeria at large negatively.
“At a time when there’s a scarcity of foreign exchange, the little we have is spent on expatriate pilots. Some of them work half a year but receive a salary for a year. Also, the salary of one of those pilots converted to naira at the existing rate can pay two Nigerian pilots’ salary, therefore taking one unemployed pilot off the street,” he said.
The captain said there are laws limiting this in the aviation sector, adding that some airlines were at some point requesting for their expatriate quota to be increased so they could bring in more foreign pilots.
He, however, hinted that it is more difficult to regulate the private jet owners because most of their airplanes have foreign registration requiring the Nigerian pilots to possess the foreign country’s licence in order to fly those planes.
“To give honour to whom honour is due, I must praise the likes of Dangote for believing in Nigerian pilots because most of his pilots are Nigerians. Also, the Adelekes and a very few others who operate their airplanes with only Nigerian pilots, even though the aircraft are foreign-registered,” Simon said.
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Investigations by BusinessDay showed that there are over 35 people in Nigeria, many of whom are politicians, who have private aircraft.
It was also gathered that for each of these aircraft, the owners can employ four to eight pilots, depending on usage and turnaround time of the plane.
Abednego Galadima, president of the National Association of Aircraft Pilots and Engineers (NAAPE), told BusinessDay that most of the presidential aspirants had leased aircraft but some of them own aircraft.
According to Galadima, for leased aircraft, most of the aircraft do not have Nigerian registration, and in this case, the law permits the use of expatriates for some period of time but the association frowns on this because it causes capital flight.
“I believe they can make do with our local aircraft service providers. The unemployment rate among our national pilots is a cause of worry for us as an association. Most of the unemployed are young pilots. This is affecting the future of pilots in Nigeria. This is not good for the development of the industry,” the NAAPE president said.
He said the unemployment situation had been worsened by the tough operating environment for local airlines, especially with aviation fuel prices making it difficult for them to employ more pilots or train young pilots.
Sam Adurogboye, head of public relations at the Nigerian Civil Aviation Authority (NCAA), told BusinessDay that he was aware that private jet operators had engaged expatriates as pilots but the NCAA allows this because the agency works with manuals and documentation.
“If an aircraft is dry leased, according to its manual, then it means the aircraft will come with its crew and pilots. This doesn’t happen for wet lease aircraft or aircraft solely owned by the jet operator or owner,” Adurogboye said.
He said the NCAA would not allow whatever is against the laws of the country.
