So what I am saying is that the operator will be faced with economies of scale. He would see that maybe it is only about 10 days to maximum 14 days in a year that the visibility gets so bad. And then he will say to himself, okay I have 10 airplanes. If I have to equip all these 10 airplanes with the equipment, train the pilots to fly Category 3, keep them current and proficient, it will cost me X amount. In those 14 days, how many times am I going to attempt to enter Kano in daytime in reduced visibility? Then some of them will take the option of losing that 14-day market because it pays them more doing. I am saying it from practical experience. We try to enforce it on them and, you know there is no compulsion in this; it is the style and choice of business. So, what is important for government is to provide the equipment and if the operator feels so he installs on his equipment.
We cannot force him to put the equipment in his aircraft because it is not a safety critical. Well, yes, if he doesn’t fly in there it is not critical. But if he flies in there, then we will insist that he puts it in his aircraft. So that you won’t say okay, well, I was flying Max Air the other day, they delayed until night because they want to use the runway lights, because they cannot come in during reduced visibility. So it is to tell you that perhaps Max Air does not have that equipment in their aircraft or they don’t have a competent pilot. But so long as you want to operate in bad weather condition, in reduced visibility; your pilots must be able to have the competency to fly Category 3 and the aircraft must have the equipment on board.
Airline operators, and interest groups in industry are really in support of the plan to concession major airports in the country because they want better infrastructure at the airports. Have they openly supported you and how would you rate their support?
Well, I would say that they have given their support. And I would say also they are happy because the meaning of concession is that you are going to have new businesses, new way of doing business, better service, better airport environment and so on so forth in private hands. So ease of doing business will be tremendously improved and that is what entrepreneurs are looking for. All those entrepreneurs around the airport they suffer from so much bureaucracy of government that is slowing down their performances. So if we handover the airport to private sector who are driven by quality of service delivery, then it will be the better for all. And we have seen it in the seaport where efficiency has improved by over 3,000 percent. So I think they have given their support maximally and I think they will continue to give us support.
What is your reaction to the fact that after your encouragement, Nigerian Airlines have started acquiring brand new aircraft?
Well, our job or my job as a Minister is to continue to lead the industry and give the necessary advice and support so that they will continue to provide the services we need and to employ our people. That is the primary purpose of being a Minister and leading the policies of civil aviation in the country. So having said that, I truly believe that those that took to our advice would have seen the benefits and those that didn’t would have seen the consequences of ignoring advice. So we are here to guide them.
We are here to set the framework. We are here to create the policy to make them understand and see how things could be done. And so they improve their own efficiency and service delivery. I know of an airline that initially when we insisted that they must bring newer airplanes because it is more efficient for them. The direct operation cost of the airline would be much lower and the maintenance will be much lower on and so forth. They thought that we are being vindictive but later when they took to our advice, they wrote us a letter addressed to me personally, saying, Honourable Minster, We think that when we came in you did not like us. But now we see, now we know that following your advice means that we are doing very well. That airline is Air Peace, if I can even mention them. They wrote us a personal letter telling us that we are doing very well and they think that they will continue to follow our advice.
What is your review of the growing passenger traffic? Do you think the industry is on a new trajectory or what is happening is mere happenstance occasioned by the insecurity on the roads?
No, it’s not true. All those policies that we have been trying to do in our modest way from 2015, till date. In fact, there was more insecurity in Nigeria before the coming of Buhari. There was bombing all over the place, of churches and mosques and schools, and public buildings, and roads and so on. There are blockages by armed robbers and everything along the road. So that is not a factor at all. What is the factor is what the government has been doing to reposition civil aviation, to create the right policies, to ensure there is level playing field, to drive prices down, to encourage people to come, to increase ease of doing business and also to raise passenger confidence and show them that this industry can work and this services are being provided. So proficiency to fly has increased in Nigeria due to those policies and there are options and there is availability.
In the international aviation circles, what mileage has Nigeria gained under your watch as Minister of Aviation?
They are too numerous to mention, but maybe I will take it bit by bit. Let me even start from the one that is most forgotten all the time. Under our watch, for example, the Nigerian College of Aviation Technology has become the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) center of excellence.
They have the highest number of ICAO courses delivered. They were the highest number of ICAO causes delivered in the world and they have the highest number of instructors in the world and that happened under our watch. Two, for example, if you take that out, you kick in Nigeria Meteorological Agency (NIMET), Nigeria Meteorological Services, under watch they are providing MET services to the Gambia, to Liberia, and so many other countries within the sub-region. They have also received ISO certification, ISO, as 9001, 2015 version, as the best-MET service in Africa. Also, when we came during the last ICAO audit, we have raised the security score on that their dashboard from 60 per cent to 96.7 per cent, this is near 100 per cent.
The only countries, about three or four countries around the world that scored better than we did, these are UAE, US and one other country. But we scored 96.7 per cent in security. And we have also improved in safety from a mere 50 per cent to about 67 percent and still going. Today, for the first time in the history of Nigeria, from amalgamation 1914 till date every government has failed to certify our airports. It is the first time that Nigeria certified its airports, Abuja and Lagos. And we are on our way to certifying many more.
So internationally we are scoring points and perhaps I can line them up for you at later interview. Before I come to that, in international space, we ensured that the Cape Town Convention is implemented in Nigeria. We have done that. we have demonstrated it twice during our administration.
Earlier on what happened was that people go to lease aircraft, bring them in, refused to honour their lease obligations and then the owners will want to come and take the airplane and Nigerian entrepreneurs will go to court and Nigerian courts will stop them. That has ended since the coming of the Buhari Administration. We have ensured that if you default, you come and take your airplanes. So far, three airplanes have been taken out of Nigeria applying the Cape Town convention. This is also an international achievement, which hitherto was not there.
Do you have a projection of what Nigerian airlines will save if they take advantage of the MRO and Leasing Company you are going to establish?
It is quantum of money that will be saved, it is difficult to project, but let me just give you a scenario. If you have say, a Boeing 777 in Nigeria, operating and you want to take it for maintenance outside the country, the ferry cost one way is quarter million dollars. So, two ways is have a million dollars. So if you have 10 aircraft of that type in Nigeria, the ferry cost alone will come to N5 million per annum or more plus, the cost of maintenance that will be done outside, plus other people’s economy that will be improved when the Nigerian company pays for the maintenance. Overseas maintenance means jobs are being exported when you take the airplane to another country to be serviced. But if you bring it in, jobs will be created, the GDP will be rejuvenated and contribution of it will be increased. And also jobs will be created by the maintenance. So saving costs by going out and saving the dollars and keep it in Nigeria and spending it in Nigeria, quantifying it will be challenging, but I can tell you it is humongous.
Will you still describe Nigerian airlines as debt ridden or are they paying their debts now?
Well, that is an unfair question for me to really answer in public because I think I may not be able to expose their financial status. But what I want to say is that we have economic regulation going on in NCAA. We will ensure that these airlines are financially healthy. If they are not, we will stop them from flying because that is also a safety item. So all that we are doing, we are ensuring that in our own efforts to apply the economic regulation tool over these airlines would not allow them to be insolvent. This is because we have seen what it has caused Arik Air and Aero Contractors when they about to go down. And don’t forget, we have bad and nasty experience, when we came in, someone closed down Nigeria Airways, refused to pay the workers. We came in many years after and found out that their money have built up to about N75 billion.
At the time when Nigeria was in recession, when the exchange rate had gone up, when the price of crude had dropped from $140 per barrel to about $17 per barrel. During that hard period, the President Muhammadu Buhari released the sum of N75 billion to pay these Airways workers. So that in itself we did and we show that we are workers friendly and I think that has demonstrated to the world how seriously president Muhammadu Buhari takes issues of jobs and saving them, and ensuring that we are doing the right thing to develop the industry.
What is your rating of the security situation at the airport so far?
Well I think so far we are safe. And then for the first time President Muhammadu Buhari had signed and authorised the aviation security to be armed. We are on our way to training them and retraining them to further secure the airport. We have the canine in place, we have ordered and procuring scanners of all kinds. We’re introducing infrared and all those remote sensors to be able to carry out surveillance around our airports. We will be using drones and so on so forth. So a lot is happening in the area of security, which you don’t see and which are not for the public eye, but I think we are getting more and more secured. And then, of course, I should be able to say much more after the audit.
Finally you did very important work at the Abuja airport runway, and repeated the same success at the Enugu airport runway. You took over the international terminal under construction at the Enugu airport. When do you think that terminal will be completed?
There are five terminal buildings being built by CCECC. Four of them were under Chinese loan. The one in Enugu is under National budget. The ones that are from the Chinese loan, we made sure that we followed them diligently and they are being completed. Enugu is about 65 to 67 per cent completed because it is happening within budget. We have applied for special funding from government. And also we are following the budget as well. Last time I released N1billion to Enugu to continue the works.
And I hope that we will be able to finish Enugu before the end of this Administration.
We believe very strongly that aviation is the alternative to Africa’s integration, to Africa’s commerce, to Africa’s trade, to Africa’s tourism. This is because 90 per cent of tourists arrive their destination by air. We do believe that if you compare air transportation to rail or road or waterways, just think about how much money will be committed to link all these countries by rail, over road and how much money will be used to maintain this rail lines and the coaches and also roads and compare it to aviation. And even if you do so think about the speed at which you can get to Nairobi from Abuja by air by rail or by road, and Then you do the math yourself. So we do believe that with the coming of SAATM (Single African Air Transport Market) which is a flagship of AU and is part of the AU agenda 2063, I think Nigeria will be a very good candidate to take advantage of this SAATM and to develop civil aviation to greater heights.
