The
Minister of State for Aviation, Sen. Hadi Sirika, says the proposed national
carrier will be private sector driven.
He
said that would help the country avoid the mistakes that led to the failure of
the defunct Nigeria Airways.
Sirika
stated this on the sideline of the ongoing International Civil Aviation
Organisation World Aviation Forum on Wednesday in Abuja.
The
theme of the forum is “Financing the Development of Aviation Infrastructure.”
He said that stakeholders had agreed on a Public Private Partnership
arrangement for the new national carrier.
The
minister explained the Federal Government was following Infrastructure
Concession Regulatory Commission guidelines to ensure that due processes in the
arrangement.
According
to him, government has appointed the Transaction Advisers to work out
modalities for the carrier.
He
said that government intended to go into alliances or joint ventures with other
aircraft manufacturers to increase the reach and number of routes of the
national carrier.
Sirika
added that the planned improvement of airport and air navigation infrastructure
would support the expected growth from activities of the new carrier.
“The
question of national carrier, we all have an agreement that this national
carrier can only survive and succeed if it is private sector led and driven.
“Public
Private Partnerships in Nigeria are guided by an act of parliament which is the
ICRC Act 2007 that spelt out how to go about doing all these things.
“We
will be following them diligently. But unfortunately, it is cumbersome but we
are following it so that we don’t run afoul of the law.
“African
Development Bank and other companies are discussing with us on this matter.
“We
are yet to meet with other stakeholders but we expect to meet them during this
conference and after then, we will go and do our road shows.
“The
key thing here is having something that will stand the test of time so that we
don’t start and falter.
“It
has happened to Nigeria before. The Air Nigeria was founded and at some point,
it died because of something that was faulty.
‘’We
have learnt our lessons and we are not going to repeat it again,” he said.
Sirika
admitted that one of the major challenges of air transportation in Africa was
high taxes.
He
said that the issue of high taxes would be discussed as a critical factor to
encourage investors.
“The
lower the tax, the more flights in and the more flights in, the more
passengers, more jobs, more revenue and that is within our master plan.’’
Source: PunchNG
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