Nigeria Air: Fresh or foul?

Let’s begin, as in such cases as we are about to discuss, with clearing the cobwebs. I love the idea of our having a national airline. Smaller, less prosperous countries have enhanced their brand through their national carrier. In the days of Nigeria Airways we walked tall. We had some of the best fleet on […]

Let’s begin, as in such cases as we are about to discuss, with clearing the cobwebs. I love the idea of our having a national airline. Smaller, less prosperous countries have enhanced their brand through their national carrier. In the days of Nigeria Airways we walked tall. We had some of the best fleet on the continent. Our safety record matched those of the more developed countries. Our pilots were regarded as some of the very best in the world. 

But all that sounds like ancient history now. If you told the younger generation that there was a time when you did not require visa to visit London and that discounted student flight ticket from Lagos to London by Nigeria Airways was 60 Naira, he would think you had taken an overdose of codeine. Those were the days when, although our airports did not match the opulence of the Hong Kong International Airport or Japan’s Haneda Airport – they were, nonetheless, airports worthy of the name. Functional, well tended airports plus a well managed national carrier – we couldn’t have had it better.

The despoliation of national assets and institutions under military dictatorship robbed us of our glorious past. Now, most of the contraptions we call airports are mere air-motorparks, complete with zero maintenance, pungent smells, hustling touts and unmitigated confusion so adroitly programmed you would be amazed that flight operations could ever be conducted successfully. But they are, amazingly!

Try using the restroom at the Arrival lounge of the Murtala Mohammed International Airport, Lagos; the Mallam Aminu Kano International Airport, Kano; the Port-Harcourt International Airport; or the Enugu International Airport… and a trial would confound you!

It is in this context that I cannot understand why Nigeria’s Minister of Aviation, Hadi Sirika, opted to cure ringworm in London while leprosy mangles the feet in Nigeria. Desirable as it is, a national carrier is not Nigeria’s problem at this time; functional airports are. Perhaps the (extra-budgetary) $300 million earmarked for the project in which Nigeria would wind up with 5% of the shares, could have been better expended on our airports. 

Speaking at the Farnborough Airshow in London following the unveiling of the new national carrier, Minister Sirika reportedly announced that the airline would operate 40 domestic, regional and sub-regional and 41 international routes, on a Public-Private Partnership model, while investors and strategic partners would decide who would run it. 

“This airline is a business and not a social service”, said Sirika. “It is not intended to kill any airline in Nigeria but complement it and promote it. It must be done in the right way so that it will be here to stay. Government will not hold shares beyond five per cent at the topmost. This airline has the backing of the government. Government will come up with funding according to the business case that has been delivered to the government.… We want to use this airline to make a statement that yes, we can do it.”

Unfortunately, what the London launch has done is show the world that we don’t know how to do things right. CNN’s Paula Newton thinks it is a dumb and fraudulent move and validated her view with a personal account by Zain Asher who narrated her ordeal at MMIA sometime ago when flights were delayed for hours on account of power outage. Zain and Paula wondered what business sense informed the loud promotion of a yet non-existent entity – no investors yet, no address, no website, no aircraft to its name yet… in a country without a single airport of international standard!

Technocrat Mustafa Chike Obi took to Twitter to express his befuddlement: “Am baffled. Air France/KLM paid 286 million dollars for 31% of Virgin Atlantic last year, but we are putting up 300 million dollars for 5% of a start-up airline? Would really appreciate a rational explanation”.

I don’t think the opaque arrangement in the Nigeria Air promotion meets with the standards of probity of the Buhari administration. Pray, who are the subscribers of the remaining 95% equity?

How would a 5% stakeholder be saddled with funding the business? What was the source of the purported $8 million spent so far in chasing this expensive shadow? Under what/whose auspices was the lease agreement with aircraft manufacturers reached – government or the phantom investors?

This is not how things ought to be done. Some of us have become notorious for backing the current administration’s war against corruption, warts and all. But I am unable to explain to myself how the nation is being goaded into this wasteful path. If we want to incorporate a privately run public limited company, why not just allow financial experts put the papers together and approach targeted core investors through the capital market?

In the days of Nigeria Airways, all the maintenance of the Ethiopian Air fleet was done in Lagos, Nigeria. Now, Ethiopian Airways has a fleet of 100 and is run strictly as a private concern even though government owns it 100 percent. Truth be told, the kind of discipline required to run a public-owned business with the efficiency of the private sector is not quite fashionable in today’s Nigeria.

Running a successful national airline is not beyond us. We have done it before, but the way we have gone about it this time is exactly how NOT to do it. Nigeria Air, as currently conceived, doesn’t smell good.