Chinelo Obogo
The Minister of Aviation, Hadi Sirika, has said that the Akanu Ibiam Airport, Enugu, would be opened for local and international flights before Christmas.
Speaking on Channels Television, the minister said that work is ongoing and if there is sufficient fund to complete repairs on the dilapidated runway, the Federal Government intends to open it before the Christmas festivities commence.
“Work is ongoing. If everything goes as planned and we get all of the funding, we intend to open it before Christmas. Work does not necessarily mean the bringing of equipment into the airport to begin the reconstruction of that particular airport or runway; work entails the planning, mobilising people for work and the actual work itself. The planning is even more important than the work itself because when you plan very well, you succeed.
“ This runway closed itself because it actually failed and we kept trying to get it to function very well. But it kept failing on a daily basis. We were afraid that what happened in Port Harcourt many years ago could happen on this runway because in Port Harcourt, it was failing and the then Ministry of Aviation was doing the best it could to keep the runway safe. But unfortunately, the runway started to fail beyond expectation and when Air France landed, it got stuck. It took two years and half to get the runway back to function properly.
“Every airport will have its maintenance programme with the facility management and then set things in place now so as to be able to do maintenance when due. And if it needs total resurfacing and reconstruction , we would do all of that,” Sirika said.
Following a regulatory framework to shut down the Akanu Ibiam Airport, the Federal Government announced in May that the airport would be closed and domestic flights would be diverted to the Owerri Cargo Airport, while international flights would be diverted to Port Harcourt.
The Federal Government, through the Federal Aviation Authority of Nigeria (FAAN), issued a shutdown date for August 24, 2019 for rehabilitation of the runway and upgrade of its facilities to international standard.