Apart from meeting the basic safety standard required of an airport, not one airport in the country has been certified by the International Civil Aviation Organisation (ICAO).
The airports are under the supervision of the Federal Airport Authority of Nigeria (FAAN), an agency of the Ministry of Aviation
As part of requirement for ICAO certification, an airport must have operational and perimeter fencing, certified aviation security personnel, state-of-the-art navigational equipment, while the personnel must be regularly trained and retrained.
Other conditions include standard runway and runway strength known as the Pavement Classification Number (PCN) which enables airports and airlines to know if a given aircraft may put undue stress on a runway, non-interference from government, adequate fire tenders, standard instrument landing systems, fuelling, baggage handling, apron and quick response to distress, among others.
As of today, most of the airports, including the four international airports in Lagos, Abuja, Kano and Port Harcourt, have not been able to meet the conditions.
Speaking on the issue recently, the Director-General of the Nigeria Civil Aviation Authority (NCAA), Harold Demuren, said the non-certification of the airports would continue for the time being, unless relevant aviation agencies put in place the necessary requirement by ICAO. He, however, added that the non-certification status of the airport does not imply that they cannot do safe operation.
“There is a requirement you must meet before meeting ICAO and NCAA certifications. If these requirements are not in place, I will not certify. Take Lagos for example; there must be perimeter fence; the same with Port-Harcourt International airport.
This does not mean the airports are not safe. There have been mitigating factors because the airports are monitored regularly as inspectors go through them”, he said.
Sources within the FAAN revealed that the non-certification of the airports was due largely to the high cost involved, while agencies saddled with the responsibility of maintaining the airports are not adequately provided for in the budget .
In some instances, investigations revealed, FAAN does not get any allocation for capital vote. In 2008, for example, the government did not release any capital vote to FAAN. In 2009, only the four international airports were made provisions for in the budget.
“A minimum safety standard has been achieved in the airports in spite of the present status. Safety is not something you achieve overnight and relax. It is an on-going exercise”.
“The Federal Government has started taking keen interest in the security of the airports through the office of the NSA (National Security Adviser) and soon all the old security gadgets would be discarded for modern ones”.
According to him, “it is not that FAAN is not insensitive to the need to get the airports certified, but certification involves a lot of things in terms of safety measures, security, infrastructure, record management”.
He however revealed that the agency is working closely with NCAA and has been putting in place some of the things the regulators have asked for.
“But we cannot do all the airports in the country at the same time, we are starting with the international ones in Lagos, Kano, Abuja and Port-Harcourt. And because of the seriousness we are putting into it , it would form the major part of our budget in 2013”.
He however pointed out that it is not only the responsibility of FAAN to ensure the certification , it involves other directorates in the agency and government too, “but we are doing a lot now including the on-going remodelling of the airports in the country”.
According to him, N152 million to be sourced from Internally Generated Revenue (IGR) was budgeted in 2010 in order to upgrade and meet certification parameter while another sum of N50million has equally been earmarked in the current budget by the Operations directorate for repairs and construction of perimeter fencing.
Culled:dailytimesnigeria
No comments:
Post a Comment