The Federal government has revealed that Nigeria’s national airliner, Nigeria Air, is expected to commence by April 2022.
Disclosing this to State House Correspondents after the Federal Executive Council (FEC) meeting, presided over by President Muhammadu Buhari, at the Presidential Villa Abuja, Minister of Aviation, Senator Hadi Sirika hinted that FEC gave approvals for the new national carrier.
He stated that the new national carrier would create about 70,000 jobs when fully operational.
He noted that the national carrier would be run by a company in which the Nigerian government will hold a 5 per cent stake, Nigerian entrepreneurs holding 46 per cent, while the remaining 49 per cent would be reserved for yet to be assigned strategic equity partners, including foreign investors.
According to him, “The contract was given to Messrs Arif Investment Nigeria Limited, who are representatives of Empik GmbH. This Empik is 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 a completion period of six months. So that’s the first memoranda.
“The next one also is the 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 the Council.
“The structure of the proposed airline; the government will be owning not more than 5 per cent. So, 5 per cent is the maximum equity that government will take, then 46 per cent will be owned by Nigerian entrepreneurs. So, if you add that, it’s 51 per cent. So, it’s 51 per cent majority shareholding by Nigerians and then 49 per cent will be held by strategic equity partners 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 the 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.”
