The Director-General of the Nigeria Civil Aviation Authority, Capt. Musa Nuhu has disclosed that the recently introduced civil aviation regulation, requiring a minimum of six aircraft for start-up airlines, is intentionally implemented to safeguard the viability and stability of incoming airlines within the aviation sector.
Nuhu also said the acquisition of six airplanes is not restricted to new entrants, he stated that the old ones also have a period by which they have to comply.
In a virtual meeting with aviation correspondents on Thursday, many of the country’s airlines do not have the capacity to meet their current financial obligations.
He said, “If you have three aircraft for instance and you lose one out of it, it has become a problem to meet up with your operations then, you start to have issues with flight delays, cancellations, and all that. The number of aircraft you will have will depend on the kind of operations you want to do.”
“You can imagine somebody who comes in with just one or two aircraft and one of the aircraft goes out of business and sells tickets to the passengers, think of what will happen. For you to have six aircraft, it shows you have very strong financial backgrounds of running an airline.”
“If everybody has one or two aircraft, we will keep having this recurring problem. We have to avoid that. People will criticize, but every country is different. We have to look at our own peculiar history and try to come up with solutions, but regulations are not cast in stone. If the situation changes, the regulation would be reviewed accordingly. Whenever it is necessary, we don’t have to wait for five years before we make amendments,” he added.
The aviation regulatory he further stated is trying to institutionalise NCAA; make it a proper institution so that the standard is maintained across board, he, however, noted that it is still an ongoing process.