SECURITY

NDLEA Decorates Seven Deputy Commanders in Benin City

The Edo State Commander of the National Drug Law Enforcement Agency (NDLEA), Mitchell Ofoyeju, has decorated seven officers recently promoted to the rank of Deputy Commander of Narcotics by the Chairman/Chief Executive Officer, Brig. General Mohamed Buba Marwa (RTD). The event took place at the Command’s headquarters in Benin City and was marked by pride, […]

Airlines

He said that government came up with a policy, which banned aircraft that are 22 years from being brought into the country for schedule service, but the reality is that at 22, most aircraft are still at their peak of operation with effective maintenance. “Following lots of crashes in the past, government came up with a policy that says aircraft that is 22 years is banned in Nigeria as commercial airplane. To me, let’s evaluate 22-year old aircraft ban. If you ask me, it doesn’t make sense. There are extremely few countries in the world that restrict aircraft in terms of age. We focus on maintenance culture. Proper aircraft maintenance is not reactive but proactive. That is what you do on airplanes. So, you don’t wait for things to spoil before you change and stuff like that. There is a lot of checks done over time, every week, every month, per hour, per cycle, depending on the maintenance manual approved,” Olateruwho is aircraft engineer said. He said that it would be difficult for an investor who wish to establish an airline in Nigeria to succeed because he is limited by aircraft age; so, he cannot acquire certain aircraft, including some technologically advanced Boeing NG aircraft because some of them were manufactured in 1999 and over 22 years. According to him, “The cheapest Boeing 737 NG aircraft you can get today is between $15 million and above. We are a developing nation. Loans are not available for the operators. Everything is, do it yourself (DIY). You want to buy a brand-new aircraft, right? The US Exim and all the Exim banks in the world will be happy to fund the operations up to 85 percent, you bring 15 per cent. So, you bring your 15 percent, they are happy to fund 85 percent. The next question is, give us a bank guarantee for $85 million. Go to our banks in Nigeria today, request for a bank guarantee for $85 million, they will ask you to put $85 million cash in the bank before they can give you the guarantee.”

Recent incidents of passengers’ interface with airlines has spurred the aviation industry to re-strategise for a change. The recent incidents of passengers’ interface with airlines, which started with Senator Adams Oshiomhole, Wasiu Ayinde Marshall, also known as Kwam 1 and Comfort Emmanson have brought sobermoments in the relationship between airlines and their passengers, even though such incidents were dismissed with a wave of hand in the past. In the past, airlines […]

Airports

FAAN, Customs Partner to Halt Transnational Financial Fraud, Boost Nigeria’s Image

The Federal Airports Authority of Nigeria (FAAN) and the Nigeria Customs Service (NCS) have announced firm collaboration aimed at halting transnational financial fraud emanating from Nigeria and to meet the compliance standards of the Financial Action Task Force (FATF). Their joint, efforts they said, seek to ensure Nigeria exit FATF grey list status through the […]

Airports

Complacency, Poor Training Expose Airports to Security Threats

Without recurrent training, continuous engagement of manpower and deployment of state-of-the-art equipment, airport security can easily be compromised. There are two critical areas of air transport that seem interwoven. These are security and safety. Aviation safety is described as a step towards the prevention of accidents and incidents in the aviation industry. Safety is mostly […]

Airlines

Onyema Rallies Stakeholders on Aviation Security

Air Peace Chairman, Dr. Allen Onyema has called for the concerted efforts to improve security at airports, as records show increasing security threats on air travel worldwide. Onyema, made the call during a high-level symposium with the theme: ‘Fundamentality of Aviation Security in Achieving the Safe-Skies Goal’, which held in Lagos. He described the symposium’s theme as both timely and […]