The Director General of the Nigeria Civil Aviation Authority (NCAA), Captain Musa Nuhu, has raised hope that by the time Nigeria closes the gaps identified in the recent International Civil Organisation (ICAO) audit the scores will shoot through the air.
He added that though Nigeria scored 70 per cent which was below the base mark of 75 per cent, it was still a progress for the Nation’s Aviation Industry because there were no security concerns.
Nuhu further disclosed that work has commenced already to resolve those areas of concern aimed at closing the gaps.
Declared this while fielding questions from the aviation press at the Aviation Africa Summit & Exhibitions held in Abuja recently, he stated that in ICAO audit there is no pass or fail but that there is a target and if a country do not get the target, ICAO will send you a report with the protocol questions, giving you three months to develop an action plan, close those gaps and return to them.
According to him, there were a couple of areas Nigeria did not do well in the last audit, especially in the area of certification of airports where 10 points were lost; because the Authority intentionally did not certify airports as they did not meet the requirements.
The Director General said certifying the nation’s airports in the state they were in would have done Nigeria more harm than good because if ICAO came and saw airports certified without the required standard it would have brought Nigeria’s civil aviation credibility to zero, ending in a woeful failure and Nigerian airlines suffer for it.
However, he stated that certification is holistic and not about apportioning blame that one agency did well while another lagged behind, hence, he raised a concern over the need for collaboration cum working together.
His words: “They audited Nigeria and we got 70 per cent, which is below the global average, but we moved up and we did not get any significant security concerns.
“We met the authority and the industry in a very difficult time, and I keep saying this, what we are doing, we are not developing the system for the sake of passing an audit. We are developing the system for sustainability, to function the way it is supposed to function, audit or no audit.
“In ICAO, there is no pass or fail. There is a target, if you don’t get the target, ICAO will send you a report with the protocol questions. And you use that, they give you three months to develop an action plan and close some of those gaps and send it back to them.
“There are a couple of areas we didn’t do very well in Nigeria and one of the areas is the certification of airports. It is very critical; we lost 10 points or more in the area of certification of airports. And to be honest, we refused to certify the airports, because the airports did not meet the requirement for certification.
“If we had done certification and then ICAO comes and sees that they did not meet the requirement, then our credibility goes to zero and we would have failed woefully and we would have all sorts of significant safety concerns. The reputation of Nigeria will be damaged, the Nigerian airlines and everybody will suffer for that.”
However, Nuhu said in the last one or two months, with the current Managing Director of the Federal Airports Authority of Nigeria (FAAN), Mohammed Kabir, we have made progress.
“But to be honest, it came too late for us to do certification before the audit. We have all agreed, going forward we are going to do the certification. And there is nothing like this organisation did well, that organisation didn’t. It is all wrong, it is Nigeria.
“When you go to ICAO, they are not going to tell you the NCAA did 100 per cent, FAAN did 50 per cent, NAMA did 60 per cent; there is nothing like that. It is Nigeria they are going to put there and we must collaborate and work together.
“Different sections in the NCAA got different scores. Airworthiness got 94 per cent. They went from 90 to 94; that is almost perfect. Then we had the airport, because of lack of certification, most had 56 per cent. Then we have air navigation services, we had lots of problems both on the NCAA and Nigeria Airspace Management Agency (NAMA) sides. So it is those areas that really dragged us down.
“Operation was at 52 per cent, they went up about 11 points. Still a bit poor, but at least, the direction is in the right trajectory. And we will continue working and work has started already.
“We are not even waiting for the ICAO report, we know where we have issues and the work has started. And by the time we finish airport certification and other things, there is what they call ICAO Coordinated Validation Mission (ICVM).
“After you have done your audit and you think you are okay, you invite ICAO but this time around you pay for it. They will come and look at you to validate all the actions you have said you have done and then your score goes through the roof.
“And I am sure if we work collaboratively with the support of the press, the ministry, the entire industry, believe me, our scores will shoot through the air. At least the audit has shown us where we are. If we were deceiving ourselves or we were blinded by it, now it is quite obvious and we will work on resolving those areas.”