By Lawani Mikairu
THERE has been agitation among aviation stakeholders that there is need to make the leadership of the Nigeria Civil Aviation Authority, NCAA, more autonomous and assertive in the discharge of the agency functions. They contend that the current  leadership of NCAA has not been able to free itself from undue interference.

The Civil Aviation Act 2006 empowers the Authority to regulate Aviation Safety without political interference, and also to carry out oversight functions of Airports, Airspace, Meteorological Services, as well as economic regulations of the industry. It also issues licenses to intending airline operators, regulates them and regulates pilots among other functions.

Minister of State, Aviation, Senator Hadi Sirika

While some have acknowledged that NCAA may have achieved some milestones, like reducing the spate of air mishaps over the years, it needs improvements in areas like passengers protection, regulatory oversight on airlines especially private jet operators, local airlines protection and support, hiring of more technical staff, training and retraining of existing staff as well as staff motivation for optimal performance. And the current leadership does not seem to have the capacity to meet these challenges. The regulator’s capability, commitment to minute details and a knack for ensuring the strictest of standards without compromising could make the difference.

Regulatory  capability

There is a general consensus that an NCAA Director-General must have the strong will to be independent of political control and be able to implement programmes that will boost the NCAA’s regulatory capability. Also the NCAA DG must be a thorough bred professional with the strength of character and capability to reposition the industry against all odds.

With the changes currently undertaken by the Minister of State, Aviation in the aviation parastatal, stakeholders have called on him to look within NCAA to get  thorough bred professionals to reposition the agency for optimal performance. Some names have been thrown up by these stakeholders. Some names like Engr. Benedict Adeyileka, the NCAA Director, Airworthiness Standards and one time acting NCAA DG, and  Captain  Abdullahi Sidi, the Director operations and training have always been mentioned in every discourse.

Adeyileka seems to be more favoured having acted once as the Director General of this same NCAA during which he distinguished himself. He currently oversees  the Directorate of Airworthiness Standards (DAWS) a very critical directorate in the agency. He is a professional with trainings at home and abroad, and experience spanning over 32 years at senior level in the Aviation Industry in the United Kingdom, Asia, Africa and Europe.

His wealth of experience straddles across the industry in variety of roles like aircraft maintenance engineering, design and manufacturing, avionics, quality systems, technical services. As a regulator in the civil aviation authority, he has worked both with aircraft manufacturers, Airlines and Maintenance Repair Organisations [MROs] in such prestigious companies such as BAE Systems Woodford UK, Scottish Highland Airways Inverness UK, Gill Airways UK and at Gatari Air in Indonesia. As a seasoned Engineer, he has successfully been involved with Airline start-up both in the UK and Asia.

As the then Acting DG, NCAA, he supervised and executed the process that fetched Nigeria Category recertification. Also during his tenure some NCAA staff got trained abroad and he made staff welfare a priority among other achievements. Industry sources tips him more for the job having acted successfully before in that capacity and his track records.

Other achievements by Engr. Adeyileka while he acted as NCAA DG include coordination of the successful curtailment of the spread of Ebola Fever communicable diseases through air transportation by issuing appropriate procedures and guidelines to airlines; successful certification and recertification of new air operators and existing air operator certificate holders; set up committee for review of scheme of charges to boost NCAA revenue generation; continuous training of NCAA FSG Inspectors through liaison with International organisations like IATA and airbus; re-organisation and revamping of Nigeria Society of Engineers (NSE) Aeronautical Division and championed the enforcement of expatriate quota and development of Nigerian pilots and engineers in the aviation industry. He also appeals to a large segment of the staff.

Capt. Abdullahi Sidi, the Director operations and training, NCAA, a pilot is also being considered.  He attended several professional course home and aboard. He worked at the liquidated Nigerian Airways, Cabo Air, IRS Airlines, Aero Contractors among others. He is said to enjoy the confidence of the current DG and had a charisma that appeals to a lot of his staff. He currently supervises the Directorate of Operations and Training (DOT) which is responsible for the effective oversight activities and setting of standards in all areas of flight operations and training in the Nigeria air transport industry.

Retired Group Captain John Ojikutu, a member of the Aviation Roundtable, was recently quoted as listing the challenges of NCAA to include; “inadequate manpower; insufficient professionals as regulators and inspectors to enforce compliance of registrations on operators.”

He insisted “that rather than letting the government know what the NCAA challenges are, the leadership largely live in denial and give the government and public the impression that all is well at NCAA, a situation only a string committed leadership can address.”

Stakeholders  forum

Also, Captain Roland Iyayi, the former CEO NAMA and President / CEO Topbrass Aviation Limited while commenting at the Aviation stakeholders forum in Abuja said, the CEOs in the aviation needs replacing as they are not supporting growth of the industry. “If we want to see through these wonderful ideas and grow the industry, I make bold to say, that we need to have the right competencies, in the right positions and at this time, at this point in time, Hon. Minister, we don’t have the right competencies, in the right positions. If it is understood by those in the helm of affairs – the regulators and service providers – if they understand their responsibility to the industry, when stakeholders come to them and raise issues, it is important and imperative that they respond immediately” he noted.

“I give an example, I wrote an eight page letter to NCAA raising issues, it took the NCAA three months, for me to get a response. We had an FOE incidence in Abuja, we wrote to the Federal Airports Authority of Nigeria (FAAN), as I speak, we have not receive any responses to six letters and we have incurred a damage worth $268,000 on an aircraft and nobody says anything.

At the same time, the NCAA is telling on the things we need to do to get AOCs, we have complained yet they come back tell us you cannot operate. It is very sad. I’m an investor, a professional and entrepreneur but we cannot sustain our investments when we don’t have people with the right competencies’. That needs to be addressed” he said.

Should the President decides to yield to the calls and look within the NCAA for a DG, industry watchers and some members of staff have suggested the likely candidates  could  be Engr. Benedict Adeyileka as he has the ability to takle some of these issues raised by the experts.