By Newsmata
The Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer, (CEO) of Aero Contractors Company of Nigeria Limited, Captain Ado Sanusi, has attributed the very high cost of local flights to multiple taxation, over-regulation, infrastructure deficit, as well as high interest rate in borrowing, and advocated a genuine reform in the aviation industry.
Sanusi, a former CEO of the Nigerian Airspace Management Agency (NAMA) also faulted the recent decision by President Bola Ahmed Tinubu to divide the Nigerian College of Aviation Technology (NCAT) into six campuses to cover the six geopolitical zones in the country, arguing that there was no reason for it since the institution, in 60 years, was yet to achieve its full capacity.
Fielding questions on sundry issues affecting the aviation industry on Arise TV Newsnight on Thursday monitored by Newsmata, Capt. Sanusi said airlines in the country operate in a hostile environment, amid other challenges hence the skyrocketing cost of domestic flights.
Newsmata reports that return tickets to different parts of the country cost an average of N400, 000 to N500, 000.
According to him, “These challenges are known. First and foremost, the environment the airlines operate in is quite challenging; it’s quite a hostile environment. We have multiple taxation. Let me give you an instance. Every ticket we sell, we give five per cent to the Nigerian Civil Aviation Authority (NCAA) for safety oversight, but still, when they are going to inspect facilities, or they are going to inspect an airplane that is coming out of checks, we will still have to pay for the tickets, the per diem and every other expense these inspectors would pay. These are multiple taxations.
“And then if you look at NAMA, (Nigerian Airspace Management Agency) there are charges too NAMA put on airlines; FAAN, (Federal Aviation Authority of Nigeria) there are charges you put there. So many charges, so many taxes”.
The chief executive officer of Aero Contractors therefore recommended the unification and reduction in the multiple taxes “so that you can reduce the cost for running an airline in the country”.
Furthermore, Sanusi said “Give the airlines some incentives; give the airlines some access to soft loans that have single digit interest rates so that the Cape Town Convention that was celebrated, we can take the dividends of the Cape Town Convention.
“But you can’t go and start borrowing at 30, 40 per cent interest rate to go and bring an airplane and believe that you can sell a ticket below N80, 000 or at N80, 000 and think you will make money; it’s not possible.
“So, the challenges are there. The infrastructure deficit, the multiple taxation, the over-regulation, these are all things that have been looked at and we have told the government that there must be a genuine reform in the aviation industry. These are the reasons that airlines have been falling since the 70s. They’ve been failing; If I start counting the airlines that have failed…”
Over 100 airlines, according to sources in the industry, are believed to have failed over the years.
On President Tinubu’s multicampus policy for the Nigerian College of Aviation Technology, Sansi, a former CEO of the institution, said, “Well, I’m lucky I am a member of the NCAT. I don’t think it’s a good idea to do that. Nigerian College of Aviation Technology is over 60 years in existence, and I don’t think by putting it into the six geopolitical regions in the country it would expand it.
“I think you should look at the money that you are going to spend to open these campuses to put it into the Nigerian College of Aviation Technology. After all, they have not reached their full potential. It’s like saying that you want to take Havard in the United States and divide it into states and put it in all over the place. I see no reason why we should do that.
“It’s not as if the campus is filled up and the capacity is not there. We have not even reached the capacity. And the institution is supposed to be a degree-awarding institution and yet it is not after 60 years in existence, and we are still going to break it into six geopolitical regions. Why? Why do you need to do that? It’s bad enough that its not being looked into”.