Nigeria Air to take off April 2022 – Sirika

*FG, Nigerians to hold 51% equity

Ukpono Ukpong

The Minister of Aviation, Senator Hadi Sirika, has said that the new national carrier, Nigerian Air, will begin flights from April 2022.

Sirika made the disclosure while briefing State House correspondents at the end of the virtual Federal Executive Council (FEC) meeting presided over by President Muhammadu Buhari at the Presidential Villa, Abuja.

He said that in the new national carrier, the Nigerian government will hold a 5% stake, Nigerian entrepreneurs holding 46%, while the remaining 49% will be reserved for yet to be assigned strategic equity partners, including foreign investors.

He explained that the Federal Executive Council gave approval for the new national carrier, adding that the new carrier in few years’ time when it becomes operational, would generate about 70,000 jobs which he said is higher than the total federal civil servants in the country.

Sirika recalled that over 400 thousand Nigerians participated in choosing the name which was launched in 2018.

He said: “Today (Wednesday) in Council, civil aviation presented two memoranda. The first one is approval for the award of contract for the provision of Automated Civil Aviation Regulatory Equipment, including software support and training, which will be located in Nnamdi Azikiwe International Airport.

“In summary, this is a software that will allow all of the activities of civil aviation regulation to be done electronically on one platform, including payments, including follow ups on personnel licensing, the medicals, the economic regulation of airlines, safety regulation of airlines and all other businesses within the envelope of civil aviation will be monitored by this single software.

“It is called ‘the truth machine’ in quotation in Europe, because all of the truth of regulation of civilization will appear on this platform, it’s an extremely important software that the world has now come to terms with.

“The contract was given to Messrs Arif Investment Nigeria Limited, who are representatives of Empik GmbH. This Empik are the creators of this software, one of its kind in the world, at the sum of N1, 492,520,325, which will be including 7.5% VAT and completion period of six months. So that’s the first memoranda.

“The next one also is approval of the outline business case for the establishment of the national carrier and this is the sixth time the memorandum appeared before Council. The sixth time, we got lucky to be passed by Council.

“The structure of the proposed airline; government will be owning not more than 5%. So 5% is the maximum equity that government will take, then 46% will be owned by Nigerian entrepreneurs.

So, if you add that, it’s 51%. So, it’s 51% majority shareholding by Nigerians and then 49% will be held by strategic equity partner or partners that will be sourced during the procurement phase, which is the next phase.

“This airline, if started, and within the first few years will generate about 70,000 jobs. These 70,000 jobs are higher than the total number of civil servants that we have in the country.

Its importance had been well discussed, so I’ll not go back to it. You had discussed it separately also on various fora as to the need for it.

“But one important item is the AU agenda 2063, which speaks to integration of Africa, which speaks to the cause and trade within Africa that is intra-Africa and to which also another flagship project of AU agenda 2063 called the Single African Air Transport Market (SAATM).

“Now, the only way, the quickest way that you can integrate Africa is by air because if you want to interconnect all the 54 nations of Africa, via rail or road, or waterways, which is even impossible, the quantum of money that you need to do all of these, the time it will take to develop this infrastructure, as well as the maintenance cost, is almost prohibitive.

“It’s doable, it’s time-taking, but with aviation, within a year, once the right policy is in place, like SAATM, you can connect Africa and then of course, the needed integration will happen. It’s part of AU agenda 2063. So, these are the two memoranda that were submitted, and gladly they were passed by Council.

“The name is Nigeria Air which of course, if you remember back in time, this was subject to national debate and 400,000 people participated, chose the name, the colour, the logo, everything and it was produced that time. It was launched also in Farnborough as far back as 2018.

“So, the business case is a public document. It will be on our website, you can download it and we can give you copies. This airline will pick up and start, by God’s grace, on or before April 2022.”

Asked if the April date was sacrosanct, he said: “Well, the best case is that the airline will pick up that period, April 2022 all things being equal. But since it’s an outline of the business, we will follow the outline of the business.

It is our hope and desire that it starts on April. It can be sacrosanct records but it’s dependent upon other factors, since we are going to the market right away.”