Aviation unions mobilize against concession of airports

[Edoman]

Aviation unions mobilize against concession of airports
July 2, 2020


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Unions in the aviation sector have announced plans to mobilize against the concession of four airports by Federal Government saying the motive for giving away the four most lucrative terminals does not serve national interest.

They threatened to make the airspace ungovernable should government ahead with the concession, which they have described as self-serving insisting that the recent Certficate of Compliance handed over to Aviation Minister, Hadi Sirika as questionable .

The unions said Sirika is not giving full information to President Muhammadu Buhari on the project with the way he was pursuing the project in a hurry without following the procedures spelt out for such exercise by the relevant agencies of government.

The unions including: National Union of Air Transport Employees (NUATE), Air Transport Senior Staff Association of Nigeria (ATSSSAN), Association of Nigerian Aviation Professionals (ANAP) and AUCPTRE in a joint press briefing, accused the minister of serving his self-interest without reference to the Project Dekivery Team.

Speaking on their behalf at the Murtala Muhammed Airport (MMA), Lagos, Comrade Ocheme Aba, the General Secretary of National Union of Air Transport Employees (NUATE) accused the Minister of Aviation of completely sidestepping the team and has gone ahead with his own programme.

On June 24,  2020  Sirika received the Certificate of Compliance issued him by the ICRC which confirms that he has complied with all needed requirements to proceed with the process of concession for the four international airports in Lagos, Abuja, Kano and Port Harcourt.

However, the unions said airports to be concessioned needed  transactional scope ; which needs to be communicated publicly began re the ICRC issued any certificate of compliance to Sirika.

Aba said: “As far as we know, the Transaction Adviser has yet as at date, not submitted the report of the scope of the Transaction to the Project Delivery Team. This raises the big question as to what is really being concessioned at those airports.

“The whole airport? Or, are we to believe that only Terminals will be concessioned? Or facilities within the terminals? No one knows, except the Minister of Aviation. And this draws attention to the opaque nature of the concession conjecture.

“With the Project Delivery Team (PDT) – which includes the ICRC – was still discussing the issue of Transaction Adviser (TA), the Minister of Aviation was on air announcing the approval of FEC of a TA and his fees. Both the TA and the fees were apparently decided solely by the Minister. Up till date, the PDT has not been allowed to take a position on the matter, its effort in that direction being frustrated.”

For that reason he said, the unions have decided that it shall have to review its membership of the PDT if this type of public deceit will continue.

Aba further accused Sirika of usurping the responsibilities and powers of the governing board of aviation agencies.

“The Minister has completely usurped the functions of the management and the Governing Board of the Authority. As such he has arrogated to himself the powers to enter into agreements in the place of FAAN. This is to the extent that there is now no difference between the Ministry of Aviation and the Federal Airports Authority of Nigeria (FAAN). This is a serious infraction; a travesty and an anomaly.”

“As can be clearly seen from the foregoing, the planned concession of the only four revenue generating airports of FAAN is an ill wind of which the only beneficiary is the source of the wind. As such, our Unions come against the exercise and will resist it with our strongest stance. We are compelled to act so in recognition of our corporate citizenship and our sacred responsibility to the general public and fellow Nigerians to safeguard our common patrimony.”

On the nationwide action, the unions said: “For avoidance of doubt, our Unions with all aviation workers, particularly FAAN workers and pensioners, will not co-operate with the concession program of the  Minister of Aviation and will use every resource at our disposal to ensure that the machinations of the few against public interest ends here. The concession of Nigerian airports in the opaque manner prescribed by the Minister of Aviation must be denied daylight so as to suffer perpetual darkness.

“We shall soon publish our itinerary of public nationwide protests against this unsavory machination. These protests shall last as long as the idea to concession Nigerian airports remains alive. In furtherance of the objective, we have sought the support of the NLC, TUC and ULC for the purpose of escalating the processes of engagement and protests. Never again, with the unfortunate mistake of selling of national assets to government officials and their cronies as happened in the electricity sector, shall we allow such to happen in Nigeria. Never again!”.

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