The Chief Executive Officer of Air Peace, Allen Onyema, has advised the Federal Government to embrace the flag carrier model in floating a national carrier for Nigeria, saying the current concept is outdated.
He suggested that the country should rather invest in flag- bearer airlines instead of a national carrier which he described as ‘moribund’.
He spoke yesterday in an interview on a television programme monitored by our correspondents.
Onyema said other countries were adopting the flag carrier model, which should provide enough direction for Nigeria to follow.
Speaking on why the idea of owning a national carrier should be abandoned, Onyema said: “Contrary to what the minister had been saying about Nigeria and the importance of having a national carrier, national carrier is a moribund idea worldwide. Countries don’t go that route any more; it is a drain on any country. Those who are in it are running out of it. The phrase national carrier means government ownership. What the government does these days are flag carriers.
“British Airways is a flag carrier. It is owned by the IAG Group, just very few countries are still into national carriers like South Africa and the South African Airways is bleeding the treasury of the country. They have tried to close it several times, but the unions fought back; the government is tired.
“Countries don’t go that route, why should Nigeria in 2023 be going backwards instead of moving forward. All they need to do is strengthen the ease of doing business so that people of means, private concerns of means can invest in the aviation industry.’’
“We are not fighting for ourselves and neither are we afraid of competition, nobody is afraid of this national carrier because it will fall and fail like a pack of cards. What we are saying in AON is that they should improve the ease of doing business in Nigeria, remove those challenges that are stunting the growth of airlines in Nigeria and these airlines will blossom, but they did not.”
On whether Air Peace was interested in partnering with Nigeria Air, he said: “When they wanted to do the national carrier, we gave our comments and we knew the whole thing was shrouded in secrecy; our members told Air Peace to apply and when you go to that website, you will be blocked. We never got anywhere. We did try.”
Meanwhile, President Aviation Safety Round Table Initiative (ART) Dr. Gabriel Olowo has advised the new government to completely stay clear of doing direct business but rather drive the solution through private sector stakeholders.
Dr. Olowo said a large operational fleet and not sharing capital is the necessary and sufficient condition for good on time performance (OTP) of airlines.
He recommended that the country’s 20 or more licensed Airline operators in Nigeria should form two or three strong Alliances and or merge to form the flag carriers.
Olowo said: “Given that Nigerian nation desires national carrier and the unending accusations and counter accusations on how and how not to proceed, including court injunctions, labor crisis, etc, my recommended solution for the new government is to completely stay clear of doing any direct business at all, be it in power supply , oil & gas, communications, aviation, etc.”
Rather, he declared, government can “drive the solution through private sector stakeholders
“The 20 or more licensed Airline operators in Nigeria today should form two to three strong Alliances and or merge to form the flag carriers. Each Alliance must parade aircraft fleet size of 50 each either through Direct leases, Acquisitions, Alliances, etc.
” The three carriers will in total be parading 150 Aircrafts to equate one Ethiopian airline ( ET) (the largest airline in Africa) who today operate 144 modern Aircraft to more than 150 domestic and international destinations across five continents.
” Large operational fleet and not share capital is the necessary and sufficient condition for good On Time Performance (OTP) of airlines.
He further stated that all Bilateral Air Services Agreement (BASA) must be reviewed for competitive reciprocity with governments backing the carriers
“Thereafter, ensure all BASAs are reviewed for competitive reciprocity with full government backing to the three flag carriers who will reciprocate to all the destinations currently operated by foreign airlines only.
According to him, in the Banking sector of the economy regulators made mergers happen successfully calling on the Nigeria Civil Aviation Authority NCAA to do the same.
Dr. Olowo said: “Banking regulators made Merger happen successfully in the banking sector (with some surgical pain,) and today we can boast of a strong and competitive banking sector. Aviation regulators (the NCAA) must do the same in the circumstance.
“Needless emphasising the advantage of three reliable Nigerian flag carriers in terms of economic tariffs, efficient passenger experience, curb brain drain, reduced foreign airline home remittances, and reduced unemployment.”
Speaking on why it was yet to commence London flights, he said: “When we applied, first of all to get destination, it was difficult, later I was given destination, they gave us three frequencies, I cried out, I said why these, this is a low hanging fruit of six hours trip, I can do daily flights to London. They told me that another airline, OmniBlu was also getting some frequency and I was asking, whose airline is OmniBlu in Nigeria? Later they increased it to four and then we applied.
“You need to apply for TCO, ” they wrote Nigerian authorities to ask if they knew about Air Peace and I was denied. They said no we didn’t know them, we didn’t know they’re applying, we didn’t authorize them to apply and I said for what? So TCO, that’s the European Tech Companies Operators, you need to get this before going into any European countries for operations, they stopped us.
“NCAA didn’t allow us to go into London for four years, reasons they gave was that; Arik messed up, Arik and Medview messed up in London, therefore we don’t want to be disgraced. Not NCAA under the present DG. In fact, to the credit of the current DG, he was the one who took up the government to fight for us, in fact almost stopping BA from coming here.
“The other DG before him, for four years we were not allowed to go so who was manipulating them? For no reason when you go, they say ‘from above’ I wanted to fight but for the love of country, there are some things I would say that would turn into ethnic issue and I don’t want that, so I kept my cool.
“Later NCAA said we should get IATA audit on TCO, mind you we have IOSA and that is the highest internationally safety audit for any airline, we spent hundreds of millions of dollars to do that and at the end of the day, Air Peace passed the audit and then they said ‘now we have to audit you ourselves’ the game continued until Musa Nuhu stepped in and said enough is enough before they now allowed us apply. We are still on it.”
He also hinted that plans are ongoing to distribute palliative care to its staff as part of measures to cushion the impact of the removal of petrol subsidy.
He said: “The minimum wage in Air Peace is about N50,000 and we are in support of President Ahmed Tinubu, we addressed our staff to support the removal of fuel subsidy and that we are going to support them.
“Begining from this month, we are going to dish out palliatives to our staff in support of the government.”
He also revealed that Ethiopian Airline approached Air Peace for partnership in 2019 but he turned down the offer because of his patriotism for Nigeria.
Onyema further disclosed that according to the agreement signed for the stake of Nigeria Air, Ethiopians were not expected to bring in any money as investment into the project.
He also alleged that the leadership of the entire management of the proposed Nigeria Air, DFO, CEO, all the management positions; the headship were to be headed by Ethiopians while the deputy positions were given to Nigeria.
Air Peace boss also said the unveiling of Nigeria despite the litigation was a disregard of the judiciary which should not be tolerated.
On the agreement between Nigeria Air and Ethiopian Airline, he said: “When you look at the Nigeria Air thing, look at the shareholding, I have the agreement here, without SAHCO, Nigeria would have been in trouble.
“The leadership of the entire management; DFO, CEO, all the management positions; the headship were to be headed by Ethiopians while the deputy slots were given to Nigeria.
“Look at the shareholding; ET has 49%, there is a company called Fairfax, who is this Fairfax, it is owned by ET; their transaction advisers and they are going to get 3 percent, 1.4/1.5% of the shareholding capital which is put at $250m and ET will bring $122m but not as cash but rentals.
“It is only the Nigerian companies that are going to bring money; SAHCO and MRS. I have the document here. ET is not bringing a penny into Nigeria, ET will pay rentals for their own plane for five years, it is written here black and white. Even if they pay the $122m, Air Peace alone is worth over $2bn, as I speak to you, Boeing is in my office now for the delivery of our 737 max which is costing over a billion dollars.
“The aircraft from Embraer that we started receiving cost about a billion dollars; five of them have entered Nigeria, ET is bringing nothing and they are going to get 49 percent of your countries wealth, I call on president Ahmed Bola Tinubu to immediately dissolve this charade called Nigeria Air and start his own thing.”
On being approached by Ethiopian Airline for partnership, he said: “What Ethiopia is doing with the national carrier, they wanted to do it with me but for love of country, I turned it down.
“April 10 2019 in a letter, they came to me and they wanted Air Peace to collaborate with them, they took us to Addis Ababa and we signed an MoU and in the MoU, they said we need to push out the gulf carrier and I said no problem. I am very proud of what they have achieved as an airline, they are the pride of Africa but when we got to the nitty gritty of the meeting, what they wanted was to come into Nigeria, do local flight and then use Air Peace flight to fly the whole world with about 150 of our BASA while paying me royalties and one of them said I don’t need to be buying planes again but in the letter I wrote to them, I said, where does it leave my country Nigeria?
“You will destroy jobs and kill the other airlines and Air Peace and Allen will be swimming in money. So, we rejected it in a letter and it is documented and in court today. So, for people saying we are afraid of competition, if I was afraid, I would have taken their offer because I had them on a platter of gold. Nigeria and these airlines will blossom, but they did not.”
