Amidst huge indebtedness by domestic airline operators to service providers in the aviation industry, the President, Aviation Round Table Safety Initiatives (ARTSI), Dr. Gbenga Olowo has condemned the N4 billion bailout fund by the federal government to cushion the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on their operations describing it as insensitive.
He said: “Mr. President and Minister Hadi Sirika, thank you for the palliative. Domestic airlines alone are owing about N22 billion to the Nigerian Civil Aviation Authority (NCAA). In business losses, they lost N360billion. This is all as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic. Reasonable countries intervened in their aviation industries in the second or third month. This is the eighth month and Nigeria is just responding.
”I think the government should just leave us to die, then we will know Nigeria has no aviation industry. N4billion palliative for the aviation industry is very insensitive. I condemn it totally.
”The airline industry is not made up of aeroplanes alone; there are allied services, people that produce onboard service are part of it; there are those who produce distribution, which we call sales and marketing, these are now outsourced and it is all part of the aviation industry.
”This is without forgetting handling companies, they are all part of aviation. So how do you want to share N4billion among them? If you put that money into the well of debt of Arik alone, it will swallow it. It is better the government does not intervene and tell us they cannot help us because they have to pay senators and House of Representatives members.
“For us, aviation as a means of travel is the fastest and safest, and we will make sure we do the right thing in the industry. Safety is our foremost concern and government interference will not disturb us.”