SAN FRANCISCO, October 29, (THEWILL) – The Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer of the Asset Management Corporation of Nigeria (AMCON), Ahmed Kuru, has called on the Nigerian government to convert Arik air into the country’s national carrier.
A statement by AMCON spokesperson, Jude Nwauzor, said Kuru made the call in Abuja on Monday when he appeared before the Senate Committee on Banking, Insurance and other Financial Institutions led by Uba Sani, Chairman of the Committee and Orji Kalu, the Chief Whip of the Senate and Deputy Chairman of the committee.
According to the statement, Kuru said his agency has retrieved Arik from the brink of collapse and restructured and positioned it on the path of growth and profitability adding that a new airline will cost the federal government a fortune, especially in the face of the nation’s tight budget.
He said the National Assembly should, therefore, ensure that the government leverages on the potential of the airline as a stepping stone towards setting up a national carrier rather than trying to set up a new airline brand from the scratch.
Kuru noted that with the right support and investment, Arik has all that it takes to become a massive airline given the volume of reformative work AMCON did upon intervention in 2017. But to do that, Kuru said the National Assembly owes it a duty to reform the aviation sector by reducing the different layers of charges by different agencies, which makes it extremely difficult for airlines to survive in the country.
“Arik has enough aircraft and facilities that can be used to set up a new airline.
“Even if the government wants to set up a national carrier to service just the domestic market, which currently has a lot of gap, it is possible with what Arik currently has. Today if you want to travel to Lagos from Abuja and you did not book your ticket two or three days earlier, the chances are that you may not get a seat, which tells us that there is a serious gap.
“To address the gap means that operators such as Slok Airlines and the likes may have to come back to Nigeria air space. But for them to come back, there needs to be a lot of aviation reforms, so that it will be attractive.
“There is something the National Assembly should do to help the aviation industry. Why is it that there is no airline in Nigeria that has successfully existed for 10 years? We have successful businessmen in Nigeria, which tells you that what is happening in the aviation sector is a structural problem that needs to be addressed and I think the National Assembly has a role to play there.
“But having said that, the current state of the sector is not helping the operators, for instance the fees and charges they pay to different agencies regulators are too high. There are quite a lot of issues that I think when we sit down to address, we should be able to help the industry because it is very strategic to the development of the economy of Nigeria,” he stated.
