Recently, the Senate excoriated the plan to build second runway at the Nnamdi Azikiwe International Airport, Abuja at the whooping cost of N63.5 billion.
Senator Dino Melaye, spokesman of the Senate recalled how he and others in the House of Representative few years ago aborted the plan by Julius Berger to build the second runway at that huge cost.
Melaye said that amount of money could build two airports and compared the cost of airports built recently by some state governments and noted that the cost of building such airports were far less than the amount of money government plan to use and build just one runway.
According to reports, the Senator stated that the N63.5 billion reviewed contract was another attempt to defraud the country.
He said the contact, which was awarded at the cost of N64 billion by the late President Yar’adua administration was recently reviewed upwards N64.5 billion as the Senate made it known that it was equally not comfortable with the new contract cost and as representatives of the people. Melaye therefore urged his colleagues to compel federal government to ensure strict adherence to due process and Public Procurement Act in the said contract.
He warned that if the issue was not brought to the attention of the government, there might be another fraud in the making, given the cooperative analysis of cheaper cost across the country.
He then enumerated the costs of recent airports built in the country, positing that the cost of the proposed runway was outrageous given that the entire Gombe Airport with 3.6km runway cost N8.2 billion; Jigawa Airport cost a total amount of N11 billion; Bauchi Airport cost N12 billion, Enugu Airport was reconstructed and expanded at N13 billion while Akwa Ibom was constructed at N18.05 billion.
The Senate further expressed worry that the new Terminal 5 in Heathrow Airport with four lanes of 4km runway cost less than N25 billion and constructing a 3.8km one lane runway for N63.5 billion will be a waste of fund considering Nigeria’s present economic situation.
But there is no doubt that a second runway is needed at the Abuja airport. In fact, industry operators project that if traffic increases up to 20 per cent, not having a second runway would hamper efficiency and cause delays at the airport. Now, at peak hours, aircraft have to wait for long at the holding point, queuing to take off as flights, which are landing must be given priority.
Recently the Managing Director of FAAN, Saleh Dunoma told THISDAY why the second runway is important at the airport.
“The second runway is very important; it is key to our operations. The present runway has deteriorated so much such that we need to do a major work on it to make it better. So the second runway will be necessary. You cannot afford to close Abuja airport because it is the seat of government and it is important to our economy.
Dunoma said the scope for the runway had been developed and FAAN had advertised both in the nationally and internationally for consultant that would develop that scope into working drawings and bill of quantities so that the agency could tender them for approval.
“But we are yet to select the consultation because the process of procuring a consulting firm is what we are doing. Already, preliminary survey had been carried out in Abuja by our in-house engineers; we have a fair idea of the location of the second runway and the facilities that we need to provide there. Because we need to provide link taxiways, taxiways, aprons and some other things that will make both the new and the existing facility work together as an airport,” Dunoma said.
What Dunoma said showed that plan had started anew for the construction of a second runway in Abuja and it was prompted by the present administration which stated the necessity of building another runway at the airport. So industry observers are of the view that if a new plan is being made to build the second runway it means that it would not be the old cost which Julius Berger indicated in its first effort, considering six-year hiatus and other factors. Besides, the major reason the plan to build the runway was stopped in 2009 was because of its outrageous cost. So it is expected that the cost of the planned project be reviewed downwards in cognizance of the economic status of Nigeria now and from the global perspective, the cost of the planned runway for whatever reason is deemed outrageous.
The Minister of Aviation at the time the second runway was to be approved for construction in 2009 was Babatunde Omotoba. He once explained to THISDAY why a second runway was needed at the airport and why the cost was high.
Omotoba said that the existing runway at the airport was built in 1982 and was meant to last for 20 years, adding that the runway expired in 2002 “and that explained why there is continuous patching of the runway because it has become weak and would sag under the pressure of aircraft landings considering the fact that it is rising to become one of the busiest airports in West Africa, but the Ministers who came after me are afraid to make any move to build another runway because of the criticisms of that effort to build a second runway.”
The former Aviation Minister said that the amount projected for the building of the runway might appear outrageous, hence the criticisms but noted that the project was multifaceted and every detail was imbedded in that cost.
He disclosed that the planned second runway at Abuja airport was designed to handle an Airbus A380, the biggest aircraft in the world, with Category 3 airfield lighting, “the body length of that aircraft is 73 meters, body height 24 meters, wind-span is 79. 8 meters and its maximum take-off weight is about 569,000 kg; that is about 600 tonnes. That is like packing 30 trailers with full load of cement. That was the weight that was expected to land on that runway.”
To move forward the National Assembly and FAAN should reach a compromise on the appropriate cost of the project so that government could build a second runway at the Abuja airport, which has become inevitable.
