Chinelo Obogo
Aviation stakeholders in the Nigeria have kicked against the continuous use of foreign airlines by the Federal Government for evacuation of the country’s citizens despite the availability of local capacity.
This is coming as the Consulate of Nigeria in New York revealed that a second evacuation flight for Nigerians will be done by Ethiopian Airline on Friday, July 3.
The airline, flight number ET509, will depart Newark Liberty International Airport, New Jersey by 21.15hrs and arrive Murtala Muhammed International Airport, Lagos on Saturday, July 4.
But the Airline Operators of Nigeria (AON), the umbrella body of domestic carriers in the country have kicked against the continued use of foreign airlines to evacuate Nigerians by the government saying it runs contrary to its own directive that only indigenous carriers should be used for such operation
The Executive Chairman of AON, Captain Nogie Meggison in an interview with aviation correspondents on Monday at the Lagos Airport said that the onus still lies on government to do the right thing by protecting its own carriers, as COVID-19 fears compels government to bring back stranded Nigerians abroad.
The airline operators stated that almost on a daily basis, Emirates evacuates Nigerians from Dubai, revealing that the airlift is being negotiated and advertised by the Nigerian embassy in the United Arab Emirates (UAE), thus defying government’s directive that only Nigerian carriers should evacuate Nigerians as many other countries are doing.
He insisted that Nigerian airlines have the capacity to successfully execute such operations.
“I have worked in this industry for the past 35 years and we keep saying the same thing and that is why we are not moving forward. If the government did not give foreign carriers landing permits to evacuate Nigerians from other countries to Nigeria, they won’t come. If you can’t put your house in order who else will do that for you? We just make laws and policies but we don’t have the political will to carry out what we have said. “We see these flights coming in everyday and we ask ourselves why? Can you fly into Ghana or other countries if you don’t have landing permits? So we need to first put our house in order for things to work the way we want. I keep wondering why our airports are still not open for operations.