New Telegraph

Aviation: COVID-19 exposes industry’s bleak future

 

 

It is less than three months to the end of the year and a few days to the country’s 60th Independence Anniversary. WOLE SHADARE reflects on the aviation sector in the past few months and events that shaped the sector

 

In the beginning

 

The history of aviation industry is dated to 1925, when the first flight into Nigeria landed in Kano.

Aviation has become an integral part of the socioeconomic life of the country. The development of airlines industry since then has been characterized by many opportunities, some gains and values and some outright failures.

 

These developments have propelled the sector to where it is today and it depends on the divide where one stands to guage whether the sector has done well or not.

 

The general consensus is that there has been remarkable increase in passenger traffic; a situation that has added to Nigeria’s Gross Domestic Product (GDP). This ‘exponential’ growth has equally seen facilities being over stretched beyond their capacity. Provision of infrastructure has been far and inbetween despite several billions of Naira spent on facilities to make travel enjoyable.

Infrastructure development

 

Never had the Federal Government committed to huge infrastructure than this present government. The Nnamdi Azikiwe International Airport Abuja runway was fixed in record time. The Enugu airport runway was also fixed. Airport terminals are being commissioned in Abuja and Port-Harcourt. That of Lagos is expected to be commissioned before December 2020 according to the Federal Airports Authority of Nigeria (FAAN).

 

As Nigeria celebrates 60 years of nationhood, it is expected that many of the lofty plans of government conceptualized few years ago would come to fruition with the hope of making Nigeria a leader in aviation matters. The year also holds promise despite the COVID-19 that wreaked havoc to global aviation industry and one which many nations are yet to get over.

 

Although, many nations had eased lock-down, the global aviation sector may not recover to pre COVID-19 period until at least the next three years. There are so many issues that have to be resolved in relation to Coronavirus and air travel. It appears daunting but reposiportant  tioning the sector is achievable to ensure that the industry gets out of the situation as quickly as possible.

 

On the global scale, the impact of the pandemic on the aviation sector cannot be over emphasised. International flights are majorly grounded while only humanitarian and essential flights are allowed.

 

The prevalence of the pandemic has also impacted on the revenue of the sector and induced breach of contractual obligations amongst the key players in the sector. Considering the enormity of the impact of the pandemic on the aviation sector, government intervention seems inevitable to rescue the sector from going insolvent.

 

According to Captain Nogie Megisson, a former Chairman,   Airline Operators of Nigeria (AON), 5the pandemic cost domestic carriers almost N200 billion naira resulting in over 250,000 staff being laid off. One of the major concerns regarding the grounding of over 120 aircrafts is the high cost of servicing for equipment and planes that have been abandoned for months.

 

This means that upon reopening of the airports, money must be sourced to handle servicing of planes before flights can go on as scheduled. For this reason, the aviation sector is heavily dependent on a government bailout.

 

Enugu airport

 

The Enugu airport reconstruction appears to be the most im-portant airport project apart from the plans by the Federal Airports Authority of Nigeria (FAAN) to complete the Lagos international airport terminal that has dragged on for so long. President Muhammadu Buhari had, late last year, approved N10 billion for the repair of the Akanu Ibiam International Airport, Enugu.

 

The precarious state of the airport led to its closure, a development that was welcomed by many people. It was long overdue, to forestall accident. In fact, the Enugu airport should long have been closed for total overhauling of decrepit facilities.

 

In the true sense of it, the aerodrome has nothing to qualify it as an international airport despite billions of naira that were reportedly spent between 2008 and 2014 that many believed were not well spent.

 

But, for now, a good job has been done to raise the airport to its true status of an international airport, rather than the decrepit state the facility was allowed to degenerate. Work done on total overhaul, according to the Federal Airports Authority of Nigeria (FAAN), had reached 90 per cent completion. One of the contentious issues is airport concession that is almost packaged and almost delivered by the Federal Government.

Last line

The COVID-19 will definitely continue into the end of the year and into new year It is encouraging to see government focusing and supporting one of the most affected sectors in the world. With big financial aid packages reaching airlines and proper measures taken to control the spread of COVID-19, airlines are expected to recover in less than two years

Read Previous

Security guard swindles tenants of N5.7m, flees

Read Next

Jaji: Negotiation with bandits in Zamfara motivated by politics

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *