How Red Tape, Court Held Up Controversial Nigeria Air Project

 …Ministry Engaged Post Holders On Three Months Contracts Only

…Stakeholders Describe Exercise As National Disgrace, Want Probe

LAGOS – It has been revealed how bureaucra­cy and court injunction instituted by the Airline Operators of Nigeria (AON) stalled the controversial Ni­geria Air project, Daily Independent has learnt.

This is as major players in the Nigerian aviation industry have de­scribed the May 26, 2023, unveiling of the airline with a chartered aircraft as a national embarrassment, which must be investigated.

A reliable source close to the Min­istry of Aviation, confided in Daily Independent over the weekend that Sen. Hadi Sirika, the former Minis­ter of Aviation, was desirous of birthing a new national carrier for the country, despite the initial 10th failed attempts by previous governments.

The source told Daily Inde­pendent that rather than for the ministry to engage the post holders on a permanent basis for the acquisition of the Air Operator’s Certificate (AOC) from the Nigeria Civil Aviation Authority (NCAA), they were engaged as consul­tants, while their contracts were renewed every three months, thereby slowing down the entire process.

For instance, our source alleged that when the post holders, led by Capt. Dapo Olumide, the Accountable Manager/Interim Managing Director, was going through the AOC processes at NCAA, their contracts lapsed and the ministry was slow in renew­ing it.

This singular act, we gath­ered, affected the AOC pro­cesses and made it to return to phase one of the exercise, instead of the next stage.

The five phases of AOC ac­quisition are pre-application phase, formal application phase, document evaluation phase, demonstration and inspection phase, and certifi­cation phase.

This the source said confirmed June 2, 2023, leaked letter from NCAA with the reference number, NCAA/DOLTTS/GEN/ VOL.111/16123, with the sub­ject, ‘Re: Request to Proceed to Phase Two of AOC Certifica­tion,’ addressed to the manag­ing director of the airline, but returned the airline to phase one of the exercise.

The letter, which was signed on behalf of the Direc­tor-General of Civil Aviation by Capt. O.O. Lawani, read in part: “Please be reminded that your post holders letters of commitment to Nigeria Air have a tenure of three months and as such expire now.”

According to the source, the failure of the ministry to give permanent jobs to the post holders also discouraged the prospective employees from joining the airline as they were unsure of their fu­ture with the airline.

Apart from the account­able manager/interim man­aging director, the post hold­ers are director of operations, director of maintenance, di­rector of engineering, chief pilot, and safety and quality manager.

The director of operations must be a pilot, but not neces­sarily still flying an aircraft, while the chief pilot must be a pilot and still flies.

Besides, Daily Independent gathered that the lawsuit in­stituted against the emer­gence of the airline in the last quarter of 2022 by AON also slowed down the AOC acquisi­tion process with the NCAA.

The source insisted that without the court case, the air­line would have commenced flight services in the first quarter of 2023.

“The name of the airline is Nigeria Air Limited. In other words, it’s a private company, but it is being set up by the government and not for the government to operate it. It means to employ anybody; they have to go through the civil service guidelines and no one in his right mind is going to join. So, that is why the thing slowed down.

“What the government did was to bring in consultants to be post holders for the AOC processes who will be will­ing to work on three months renewable contracts. Every­thing must be consistently renewed until we get the AOC.

“But, when they were pro­cessing the AOC, the contracts of the post holders lapsed and the ministry could not renew their contracts immediately. And, according to the NCAA regulations, the processes of AOC will stop when you don’t have your post holders. So, the team couldn’t proceed to stage two of the process. Until the ministry writes back to the NCAA, we can then extend the contract of the post hold­ers for another three months or one year in order for us to continue.

“There are thousands of staff in the ministry and they have never run an airline before. May be in the Nigeria Airways days, but of recent, no. So, they don’t know that aviation processes are differ­ent from their own process­es”, the source said.

According to the source, Olumide’s mission in the airline was only to set up the national carrier and en­gage technical personnel for the airline, a process he ex­pressed he followed diligent­ly throughout. Olumide was appointed in March 2022 by the Ministry of Aviation.

The source, however, ex­uded the confidence that the airline would still go on as planned and debunked the claim in some quarters that it lacked transparency, stress­ing that it was registered in the Corporate Affairs Com­mission (CAC).

He maintained that the only way for Nigeria to benefit from the Bilateral Air Service Agreements (BASAs) was to have a national carrier, which would also create jobs for hun­dreds of qualified Nigerians.

The source further lament­ed that Nigerians were being charged exorbitant fares by foreign carriers, arguing that with a national carrier on in­ternational routes, Nigerian travellers would benefit more.

Besides, stakeholders in the Nigerian aviation have continued to castigate the past administration, espe­cially Sirika for the launch of the airline in an Ethiopian Airline-owned aircraft.

Grp. Capt. John Ojikutu (rtd.) wondered how the air­craft got security clearance to fly into the country.

Ojikutu insisted that the action further decimated the economy and the sector in Nigeria.

Comrade Olayinka Abioye, the former General Secretary, National Union of Air Trans­port Employees (NUATE), maintained that the entire exercise was a charade and fraud against the Nigerian state.

Abioye, who said he sup­ported the establishment of a new national carrier for Nige­ria, however, expressed regret with the way the airline was unveiled in Abuja.

He declared that with a na­tional airline, Nigeria stood to gain in terms of cultural her­itage, national pride, job op­portunities and foreign direct investments, among others.

Abioye accused the former aviation minister of hijacking the process after a committee of distinguished profession­als had midwifed it.

“It is unfortunate that Siri­ka hoodwinked Nigerians and swindled us all. All said and done, he did not only humili­ate Nigerians, he also degrad­ed himself by his shoddy and unpatriotic dispositions. May we never see such individual as a Nigerian minister, and if there is the political will for his probe, it will be a welcome deal.”

Prof. Obiora Okonkwo, the Spokesman, AON, said the airline operators kicked against the launch of the air­line because the NCAA was being pressured to issue an AOC without following due process.

He alleged that some of the management staff in the NCAA who insisted on fol­lowing the due process were unceremoniously removed from the agency by the former administration.

It would be recalled that the House of Representatives last week Tuesday said it was alarmed by the launching of Nigeria Air despite an exist­ing court order restraining such action.

It called on President Bola Tinubu to ensure that all in­dividuals, groups, or organi­sation involved in the contro­versial shenanigan named Nigeria Air are brought to book, prosecuted and sanc­tioned.

The Chairman, House Committee on Aviation, Nnoli Nnaji, expressed disappoint­ment at the action of the im­mediate past Minister of Avi­ation, Hadi Sirika, during the committee’s interactive ses­sion with some government officials and other relevant bodies in the aviation sector at the National Assembly Complex, Abuja.

He said that the committee was irked by the action of the Ethiopian Airlines in the un­veiling project.