The Federal Government has announced
plans to audit all indigenous airlines operating in the country.
This is coming on the heels of
various mishaps that had occurred in the Nigerian aviation industry within the
last few weeks.
The Director-General, Nigerian Civil
Aviation Authority, Capt. Fola Akinkuotu, announced this during a press
briefing to throw more light on the incident involving IRS Airline at the NCAA
headquarters in Lagos on Monday.
He said, “We are going to audit all
the indigenous airlines, we have a continous process of auditing airlines. As a
matter of fact, we are going to do a joint audit on all the airlines working
with foriegn audit firms to ensure that there is a complete validation of all
the airlines.
“This is done to reassure the public
of the safety of our airspace and to also continue the oversight functions of
the NCAA. We intend to put in place regulations that would require all our
airlines to have an International Air Transport Association Operational Safety
audit. Many years ago, it was voluntary but this time we will make it
compulsory. Airlines would be required to have this as a way of going forward
and ensuring that their systems are tidy.”
Explaining the IRS incident, he said,
“For the purpose of reinforcement, we wish to restate that the affected F100
aircraft operated by IRS landed safely at the Kaduna Airport, following a
hydraulic alert in the cockpit while on final approach to the airport.”
He stressed that the NCAA would
continue to interact with operators on what they needed to do. Akinkuotu added
that the preliminary report from the Accident Investigation and Prevention
Bureau brought to the fore some of the issues that the agency might consider.
“We have been calling on operators to
abide by the laws, and we will continue to do so, because these operators also
have responsibilities to fulfill to ensure that they continue to abide by the
laws in ensuring total safety of passengers.”
Already, the licence of Dana Airlines
had been suspended by the NCAA on October 6, 2013.
The NCAA said it took the action as a
result of an operational audit which it intended to carry out on the airline.
On the issue of the workers of some
airlines not being paid their salaries, Akinkuotu said the issue was currently
being addressed by the authority.
“If we have any airline that we know
is not paying salaries, we will stop them,” he said.
He said that the agency would not
encourage any airline that was not financially sound to operate.
The Chairman IRS, Alhaji Ishaku
Rabiu, commended the Federal Government and NCAA on the regulation of the
activities of airline operators to make the industry better.
He said that operators would not
willingly kill people in the
process of making money
“It is important to know that
we have been in this business for 12 years and have had no accident,” he said.
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