In eight years, former President Muhammadu Buhari’s administration spent over N85 billion on Nigeria Air, the controversial national carrier, yet infrastructures across airports in Nigeria are still dilapidated.
Data by the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) and Compilation of Budgetary Allocations show that the federal government spent N85.42 billion on transaction advisers, working capital and consultancy bills for Nigeria Air between 2016 and 2023.
Despite the huge amount spent on the national carrier, the airline has not only failed to secure Air Operating Certificate, an approval granted by a Nigeria Civil Aviation Authority to an aircraft operator to allow it to use aircraft for commercial flight operations, but has also not secured a single aircraft for its operations.
Last week, Hadi Sirika, the then minister of aviation, unveiled a Boeing 737-800 aircraft, which was presented as belonging to Nigeria Air.
BusinessDay’s findings show that Sirika had contacted Ethiopian Airlines few days before the display, to provide an aircraft that would be presented to Nigerians as an aircraft belonging to Nigeria Air.
Ethiopian Airlines had obliged by repainting and rebranding one of its Boeing 737-800 aircraft.
Investigations show that the Boeing 737-800 has registration number ET-APL, Mode S Q4005C and serial number: 40965/4075.
BusinessDay’s findings show that the aircraft changed colours but ownership remains that of Ethiopian Airlines.
Latest information on flight live tracker ‘flightrader24.com’ currently shows the Nigeria Air plane is back to Ethiopia where it was brought in from.
Stakeholders have said if the resources channelled towards the national carrier were used to upgrade dilapidated infrastructures across Nigerian airports, the aviation sector would have been better off.
Passengers passing through airports across Nigeria suffer from recurrent power outage, cave-in runways, dilapidated escalators, parked up aero bridges and unserviceable screening machines, amongst others.
From the car parks to the packed-up airport infrastructures, to the crowded walkways, to insufficient security gates that slows passenger movements, unfriendly immigration officers, long queues around strategic areas of the airports, toilets with offensive odour; amongst others, have been identified as experiences that discourage travel and passenger facilitation, especially at the Murtala Muhammed International Airport, (MMIA) Lagos.
Currently, contractors are yet to move to site, eight weeks after the management of Federal Airports Authority of Nigeria had shut down the MMIA, Lagos runway for repairs, BusinessDay’s findings show.
While flight operations have not been affected by the closure because airlines have had to use the domestic runway, all international and local flights have had to adjust to using just one runway for flight operations.
“N85 billion was spent on a static display of a single aircraft. There is a need for the incoming government to investigate and audit the funds expended and approved for the ministry in the last eight years. If after eight years, all we can get is a static display of a single aircraft owned by Ethiopians that flew into Nigeria as a charter flight, carried passengers back and get Nigerians to believe the aircraft belong to Nigeria Air, it is the greatest height of deceit,” Olumide Ohunayo, an aviation analyst, told BusinessDay.
Ohunayo said the money spent on this would have been invested in the development of infrastructure across the country’s airports and upgrade of navigational equipment.
“Our category one status has not been able to provide investors while category 2 airports are getting investors bringing in millions of dollars for development of airport infrastructures and this is because there are systems in place that do not respect the rule of law. We must be able to address all past litigations to attract investors,” he said.
John Ojikutu, a member of Aviation Round Table and chief executive of Centurion Securities, told BusinessDay that there are few airports with runway lightings and this is why flights are conducted in daylight only.
He said: “How many airports have standing landing aids like the Category 2 Instrument Landing System? This also is the reason why flights approaching airports in poor visibility cannot be done even in national minima except by visual approaches.
“Many airlines are springing up with aircraft and the older ones are buying more too but the airport aprons are not not being expanded and collisions between aircraft and ground services vehicles are frequently reported in our airports.
“Government is acquiring states and private airports without human capital development for their management. For instance, as at 2006, Nigerian Airspace Management Agency was deficient in Air traffic Controllers by 300 when the airports under its management were about 20. Many too could have exited by now but how many have been recruited to fill the gap of the deficient, those that exited and those for the acquired airports?”
He explained that the same situation is being experienced with the manpower for aviation security that had an deficiency of over a thousand in 2006 with 22 airports but now over 30 with the newly acquired ones.
Rather than filling those gaps, the minister went to establish Avsec forces which have no place in any International Civil Aviation Organisation (ICAO) documents nor practised by any ICAO member nation except those in external wars like in Russia and Ukraine now, he said.
He said: “Most of the airports may have Perimeter Fences but not all have Security Fences. ICAO has advised us way back in 2004 that the MMA should have a security fence because it is very important to enhance the Perimeter Fence for security but very impossible because the closeness of the urban and private buildings are too close and have all exceeded the tolerance safety and security limits.
Read also: Nigeria Air aircraft back to regular service for Ethiopian Airlines, live tracker shows
“It is not sufficient to be buying costly and sophisticated equipment without skilled manpower in sufficient numbers. The equipment alone can not work by themselves, even robots or AI need some input of human senses to push them to active life.”
The old dilapidated aero bridges at the Lagos airport also compound the troubles of airlines and passengers.
The absence of the automated bridges have since seen airlines operating in Nigeria consistently spend millions of naira annually just to tow their aircraft into the aerobridge, a point to disembark passengers after landing.
BusinessDay’s findings show that in other countries, airlines taxi their aircraft into the aerobridge but in Nigeria, airlines pay to taxi their aircraft to the bridges because the aerobridges are old and not automated to align with newer aircraft.
While this process has continued to constitute unnecessary delays to passengers who are forced to remain in the aircraft for 15 to 20 minutes for the aircraft to be towed after landing.
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