FG is mum about the investors in Nigeria Air

The Federal Government has been urged by stakeholders in the aviation industry to reveal the names of the significant international investors exhibiting interest in the Nigeria Air project.
This followed the recent approval of three aircraft by the Federal Executive Council to begin operations of the national carrier.
The Federal Government’s role in the establishment of the airline is to support the carrier by providing an initial capital of $150 million to $300 million.
From the beginning of operations through the initial years after activities begin, the money is anticipated to be released in installments.
Nigeria Air is slated to launch operations by the end of this year, and early preparations have already begun for the national carrier’s birth.
The national carrier would be operated on a strictly commercial basis by the private sector, with no intervention from the government, as the government had made clear.
The planned carrier has obtained its air transport license from the Nigerian Civil Aviation Authority and is working to get its air operator certificate from the same agency.
Senator Hadi Sirika, the Minister of Aviation, had said that the Federal Government will own no more than 5% of the airline, with Nigerians owning 46% of the stock and the remaining 9% designated for strategic international investors.
As there is currently no viable Nigerian carrier operating long-haul services, the national carrier is anticipated to utilize a significant number of underutilized bilateral air services agreements and take advantage of the significant opportunity presented by the Single African Air Transport Market.
There has been a lot of discussion among parties about Nigeria Air’s approval of three wet lease aircraft to start operations.
Avaero Capital’s Sindy Foster, the principal managing partner, and Prof. Anthony Kila, a Jean Monnet professor of strategy and development, both stated that there were still several challenges that needed to be resolved before stakeholders would be willing to support the project.
“The issue we have at the moment is that we don’t know who the 95 per cent (investors) are right now. For an airline to be launching and we don’t know who are the majority owners of this airline is an issue, and that should be clarified before any aircraft takes flight anywhere,” said Prof. Anthony Kila, who is also an international director of studies at the European Centre of Advanced and Professional Studies, said.
Musa Nuhu, the Director-General of the NCAA, outlined how the agency had no influence on the selection of the aircraft to be utilized because it was a matter of government policy.
Mr. Chris Aligbe, a former spokesperson for Nigeria Airways, believed that leasing aircraft was acceptable; however, Mr. Alex Nwuba, president of the Aircraft Owners and Pilots Association, disagreed.
Nwuba stated: “Most startups usually start with wet leasing, particularly when you are still new and all the investors have not come in. It is when the investors come in and you have all the funds that you need that you begin to look at if you are going to take wet lease or dry lease.
“How does that solve the problem of availability of funds through the Central Bank of Nigeria or will the national carrier get its money through the black market to fund its operations?
“It is absurd, it’s essentially an absurd proposal made to a group of people that have no knowledge of what’s going on and they are acting like judges receiving information on which they judge without basic facts.”
Former President of the National Association of Nigeria Travel Agencies, Mr. Bankole Bernard, listed the advantages of Nigeria Air to the nation and its image while speaking at the recently finished Conference of the League of Airport and Aviation Correspondents in Lagos State.
In part, he remarked, “If Nigeria Air is able to come into the market, it increases the fleet in the market, brings convenience to the people that are travelling and not only that, we now start to showcase to the rest of the world that yes we could float a national carrier.
“The impression it is going to create is a significant one and is going to change the narrative. What narrative? The negative impression they have about Nigeria that we can’t do anything right but they would see this come to fruition.”
Additionally, Captain Roland Iyayi, President/CEO of Top Brass Aviation and a former Managing Director of the Nigerian Airspace Management Agency, expressed reservations regarding the government’s adherence to the law in its search for a national carrier for the country.
He claimed that obtaining an ATL would take over a year for an applicant, but that the government was able to accomplish it for the proposed National Carrier in just a few months.
Iyayi asserted that the purpose of safety certifications like ATL and AOC was to ensure that a candidate could operate in a safe manner. He emphasized that each of these procedures was designed to establish a candidate’s competence and credibility, both of which, in his view, may have been compromised by the government’s involvement in the airline.
“The government is setting a bad precedent. It is saying that you can do anything and get away with it. If the world sees that you do not have stan¬dards, it will ultimately come back to you to bite.
“If you say you have a safe process to procure an AOC, why will you tell the public that you can get the national carrier to procure an AOC within a few weeks? So, they are giving us the impression that for this particular national carrier, the rules don’t apply,” Iyayi said.
On the other 95 percent in¬vestors, Iyayi challenged the government to put such infor-mation in the public domain in order to avoid speculations. He said, “Ultimately, they fly the name of Nigeria and not just the name of anyone. How do you know who these individ-uals are? These are factors we need to know. You just don’t wake up to say ‘we are setting up a national carrier; don’t bother how we did it. We need to know how you did it.’
“I think there are a lot of issues that need to be addressed by the government. Accountability is key. Trans¬parency is very important,” he said.
He added, “And then it (Emirates offer) is an encouragement to those who are bidding to be part of it.”
But many are wondering why the minister is failing to disclose the identities of the investors, wondering if he is hiding anything from the public.

GOGAN Media.