By KINGSLEY OMONOBI, Caleb Anyasina,Abuja
The Nigeria Airforce will host its Airforce counterparts from different parts of the world in April in the NAF AIR EXPO scheduled for May this year.

In this interview with Saturday Vanguard, Air Vice Marshal Alex Badeh, the Chief of Policy and Plans at NAH headquarters, give details of what the air show piece is all about.

Alex Badeh

This project of Air Expo, how will it be able to project the Nigerian Air Force?

Well, you know that expo is like a trade fair and you might not be able to measure exactly how it has been able to project the NAF because we are not selling things but we are bringing awareness to every Nigerian that oh, there is something like that in Nigeria . We are bringing awareness to other people around the world also that if they come to the expo or if they watch it, they are going to know that we can do and are doing this kind of thing; that we have this type of aircraft because you don’t see these aircraft other than at independent day celebration or Airforce day celebration which are normally restricted just to Nigerians. That is the only day where you see airplanes flying or you see them in a parade. But with an air show, you are open to the whole world; we are on the internet and everybody will be looking at it and saying, this is air show in Africa . They will want to bring their wares because this is an avenue to sell something.

This is the second edition. The first edition was just the beginning; if you remember, we brought virtually all the Chiefs of Air Staff of West Africa. I just spoke with Korea now, and every body is indicating interest that they want to come.

I believe the Air Show will reveal that we have moved technologically in the area of aircraft repair, manufacture and  are in partnership with other countries. How does NAF stand in this regard?

As you know, we are going to have Airforce Institute of Technology, AFIT, at the air show; we are going to have AETSL, Airforce maintenance and maintenance bodies, even DICON all in that place. They come to see what we do. After that, other than say oh they manufacture this thing in Nigeria , they will be looking for partnership. As I said, everybody including Air forces from Africa is looking for market.

They will come and look at the Airforce and say for instance, so you people are into the development of Unmanned Aircraft Vehicles (UAV); why don’t I come because Nigeria is a big market for UAV. In this office, people are bringing me documents about UAVs. By the time they come and see us a small replica of UAV, somebody will say ,let me work in partnership with you. Also, we have been emphasizing in-country maintenance of our aero planes. So if they come and they see it, they will start asking how do you maintain this C–130. We tell them oh, we have our maintenance outfit here if you want to partner with us, come and partner with us and we do business. And as I said, it is also to create awareness.

During the last expo, some companies that participated made promises to establish part of their annexes in Nigeria , how far have they gone in doing that?

I can tell you that we are still in touch with them. We are supposed to have meeting with some of them today, like Allenia in particular because they brought their C27J 2010 and they are talking about establishing something in Nigeria, whereby we don’t have to go to or call anybody in Italy. The meeting was supposed to hold today but their Nigeria leader called and pleaded that we should allow them to come for the meeting next week to put some things in order. They may be having visa problem but they are coming on Monday probably. I am very confident that by the time we go for the air expo, you will see something positive but talks are going on.

Take Russia for instance, if you are buying something from Russia it has to be through a company called ‘Rosonboroexport’. Now those guys came to see the Chief of Air staff sometime last year and they promised to come and establish a national base in Nigeria because we are getting in more and more MI 34 series of helicopter.

These are parts of benefits of the air show. We are inviting them for the air show. By the time they come and see several MI 34 helicopters flying here, they may come and establish their base because with Nigeria and the West African sub region, you know there is going to be a bigger market.

Apart from Rosonboroexport, which other major players in the industry is the NAF expecting?

BOEING is sending representatives. Boeing is a major player in military aviation, but you know Nigeria climate now is not very conducive and investors are foot-dragging and I told somebody who said that if that air show is held in Kaduna , that they will not come, I said to him, who cares. Just pack and go back to your country, we will not miss you. Because even during the dark days of Nigeria, in Abacha’s period when everybody was saying if you go to Nigeria, they will kill you, some people still came and those that ventured to come went back smiling because of the business opportunities.

Those that say they will not come until things are okay, by the time thing cools down and it was democracy, the door was thrown very wide open, now you can not just walk in just like before. The Korean aircraft industry also wrote us that they are coming. But aside that, we are starting the air expo with a seminar and Chief of Air staff of India is likely to deliver the paper here in Nigeria .

If we can bring in such people, it is awareness. As you know, the Air Force is operating in an atmosphere where things are not that easy, there are so many competing demands and you can not say Air Force take all the resources. If you say that, what will you do with health, education? We are all fighting for resources that are very meager. Let people come, they will get their benefits and we will also reap our own.

Nigeria is a very big market in the sub-region, I believe the Nigerian Air Force being one of the biggest in the sub-region and aviation industry too is very large in Nigeria . How do you think these can be integrated so that they bring those countries together for Nigeria benefit?

We are a very big market and there is no country in West Africa that has what Nigerian air force has in terms of equipment. We are down because of so many competing demands and aviation is very expensive. We have a lot of C130 aircraft and I remember I attended seminar of Chiefs of Air Staff in Addis Ababa last year April. I was asked a direct question that how do I see the Nigeria Air Force in the nearest future? I replied to the question by saying, it should not be nearest future, but that today, presently, the Nigerian Air force is the leader in West Africa.

We are the only ones that can do it. For instance, we have a C130 that is dedicated to airlifting the President’s vehicles and necessary equipment wherever the president is going in Africa . What more do you need to be a leader in West Africa there is nobody? We have an helicopter International school in Enugu . There is no any other aviation school in West Africa . We have one in Zaria , Nigeria College of Aviation Technology and they are taking students from all over Africa , so we have the basic foundation; we are just trying to grow it.

The Nigerian Air Force is expanding. Right now we have Mobility command, the Training command is there, with these how equipped is the Air Force to meet future challenges?

You know, they say you eat the kind of food the money you gave your wife can prepare. We could have airplane on ground and something very small could ground it. Technologically, aviation is growing at an exponential rate. It is like we are finding it very difficult to keep on with the technology. That why our C130’s, we are sending them all out for avionic update. In present day technology, we have Instrument Landing Systems, VOR and in the other parts of the world now nobody looks out for the old one.  Because these days, you do GPS approaches, they are more accurate and they don’t fail. To answer your question, if we are given money, to put back our equipment on air, we would be very, very ready but as long as we don’t have the resources to bring all those airplanes back.

Remember we don’t make those airplanes in Nigeria , we buy them from abroad. If we get money we will take them out for repairs and upgrade. If we don’t get money, then what do we do. Mobility command, Training command; for training command the aircraft we are using, yes we have given out contract to refit them, some are ready. We have trained many pilots and that is the most important thing, you can buy an aircraft off the shelf but you can not buy a pilot off the shelf. Even if you have the money it takes time to train a pilot. And if pilot finishes the training, it takes time for him to be proficient on that particular machine you want him to go and use as a work tool. I believe before the air expo, we should call you, when we are going to wing-close to 20 pilots.

This is the second air expo we having in this country, in the first one there would have been one or two lessons learnt. What area of improvement are we expecting from this 2nd expo?

Definitely when you do a thing, the next time you are going to do that same thing, it must be better. We have seen the deficiencies of the first one and we are going to improve on it. Paris air show is done in one location, Lebujai. That is where aviation started in France . So we have chosen Kaduna because we have the air port there, that is our own and we are going to improve infrastructure and facilities in that place, you will be so impressed when you go this year.

Going by what is happening in the country, and to allay fear of investors, what are the security arrangement in place?

A lot of arrangements and because it is security, we cannot begin to itemize it here. So one cannot begin to state what you have put in place other than the physical security. There will be physical security; we are also going to use technology for security there. And we are going to collaborate with other security agencies to ensure that the thing is safe.

How far as Nigerian air force gone with its update and…?

To answer your question directly, please tell your readers to come to the air expo, they will see for themselves aero planes flying; they will be convinced. Whatever we talk about, what I think is that seeing will be the best trust of this thing. But we are at various stages many are out, many are going in, you know, you fly an aero plane for one year, you have to go for check, it is a continuous circle, sometimes you do 50 hours inspection, 100 hours inspection, 300 hours inspection, 600 hour inspection, annual inspection, 4 years inspection and so on, until you look at that aircraft and see that there is nothing wrong with it, you catch it before it develop fault.