…Scores Aviation Minister low
The Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer of Widescope International Logistics Limited, Dr. Segun Musa has said that there has never been any investment in the aviation sector in Nigeria in the last two years, even as he challenged the Minister of Aviation, Festus Keyamo to come out and name such investment if it exists.
Musa who stated this in an interview with our correspondent in Lagos recently to review the two years of President Bola Ahmed Tinubu’s administration, posited that he could not actually see anything that one could call investment as far as aviation sector was concerned.
According to him, “We have not invested in aviation, I have not even see the impact of the (budgetary) allocation in aviation. The Minister should come out to tell us this is where he has invested or this is what he has done in the aviation sector. I have not seen anything that is commensurate to the amount budgeted for the sector yearly. If I am to rate the Minister’s performance, I will rate him less than 30 percent.”
Speaking on the quality of people he appointed to head the agencies under the Aviation Ministry, Musa who is a former Chairman of the National Association of Government Approved Freight Forwarders, NAGAFF, Murtala Mohammed International Airport chapter, Lagos said, “Interestingly, if they know their onions, they cannot apply their expertise without the mandate of the person that is superintending over them.
“So, it is not really about them, it is about who superintend over them. I just want to appeal to the government, that anything that has to do with transportation, when you are trying to appoint people to superintend over it, look for technocrats, look for the experts with wide pool of knowledge in the industry to superintend over the industry and give them mandate so that when they fail, there must be a deterrent.”
The Widescope Group boss who blamed frequent flight cancellations on so many factors, however, maintained that lack of regulation was not part of it as according to him, the aviation sector in Nigeria was over-regulated.
His words, “There are so many factors and that was why I was talking about the aviation sector being over regulated because by the time you think you are through with the major regulator which is the NCAA, you see FAAN coming to say that there’s a mandate in court, then, you see NAMA coming, saying there’s an issue somewhere, you will see so many actors that have this regulatory oversight on the airlines.
“The factors that causes cancellation are numerous, they are so many. First, the weather might not be too good. There might be some dictated fault that must be rectified before the aircraft can be allowed to fly. Thirdly, there might be legal issues against the airline that will make them not to fly. I have witnessed that on Arik and one other airline. The airline was already taxing and they have to stop the aircraft and discharge all the passengers.
“But there is a gazette that says that if you have to cancel your flight, you must cushion the effects on the passengers. So, the question is, are the airlines applying that rule? Is it being enforced? And who is to enforce it? NCAA. What is the NCAA doing in this regard? There’s nothing wrong in cancellation of flight but how do you cushion the effect.
“I was coming from Paris in December, and we were delayed at the airport for close to eight hours. Our flight was cancelled, so we had to wait for another flight and for more than eight hours, we were at the airport and what the airline did for us was to give us credit to go the restaurant to eat pending the time the aircraft will be ready.
“So, cancellation of flight or delays in flight is conventional, it’s not peculiar to Nigeria but how do you cushion the effect. It is better to have your flight cancelled or delayed than to have the flight crash.”
It will be recalled that a total of 33,235 flights were delayed and a total of 1,189 flights were cancelled across Nigeria in 2024 according to the data released by the Nigeria Civil Aviation Authority, NCAA, a development which has been blamed on aircraft scarcity and poor flight scheduling among others.
Photo: Dr. Segun Musa, Chairman of Widescope International Logistics Limited.
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