FAAN workers consider resigning over airport concessioning

Workers of the Federal Airports Authority of Nigeria (FAAN) are considering resigning following Federal Government’s persistence in its planned concession exercise.

This development is coming one week after Hadi Sirika, minister of state, aviation, assured FAAN workers that their interest was of paramount importance amid the concession exercise, adding that the airports were not being sold out completely to private individuals but would be managed by them for a while for effectiveness and efficiency.

A source in FAAN disclosed that workers of the agency, who have served the agency for 10 years and above, and who are not comfortable with the planned concessioning are considering resigning.

The airports to be concessioned are Lagos, Abuja, Port Harcourt, Enugu and Kano airports. To further demonstrate its seriousness and determination to concession these facilities, the Federal Government also set up two committees last week to drive the process.

The minister gave the names of the committees as – Project Steering Committee and Project Delivering Committee, which according to him would ensure the success of the planned concession.

The source pointed out that some of the staff members were alleging that the minister was planning to concession the airports to his cronies and friends at a give a way price, adding that the proposed training of workers that would be absorbed might never materialise.

“There are lots of murmurings ongoing in FAAN at the moment over the plan to concession the airports by the government. As I talk to you, plans have reached an advanced stage to implement this plan of the government, but the staff of FAAN who are about 7,000 are not carried along.

“In fact, there is a lot of scepticism on the plan of the government. Sirika said the staff would be trained by the concessionaire, but that has never happened before and we do not see it happening,” the source said.

Meanwhile, a source close to aviation unions said plans were in top gear to commence another round of protest against the planned concession, and that the peaceful protest would take place any moment from now in all the airports.