By Etop Ekanem

An Aviation expert and Managing Director, Leading-Edge Aviation Services,Victor Mgbachi, has called on government and stakeholders to unite in improving the nation’s Aviation sector to make it  favourably with developed nations.

Mgbachi made this call recently in a media chat while sharing his thoughts on the state of the sector, in Lagos. 

According to him, his experience in the Aviation industry spans two decades and has had four stops in his entire career from NAHCO to Virgin Nigeria (defunct), Arik Air Ltd, ExecuJet  Aviation Nigeria and before joining Leading-Edge Aviation Services Limited as a co-founder and Managing Director.

He asserted that the “Aviation industry is without a doubt one of the few industries contributing immensely to the growth of our economy and as such enough funds should be deployed by the Government to improve the sector.”

Explaining further on the potential of the sector to increase Nigeria’s Gross Domestic Product (GDP), he stated. “One of the industries that relies most heavily on aviation is tourism. By facilitating tourism, air transport helps enhance economic growth, creates employment, alleviate poverty and subsequent increase our nation’s earning capacity.”

According to Mgbachi, statistics shows that approximately 1.2 billion tourists are crossing borders every year, over half of whom travelled to their destinations by air. 

“As expert in Aviation, Leading-Edge Aviation has been responsible for scheduling and dispatching tactical aircraft missions with both International and local expertise in General and Corporate Aviation (GCA) for commercial airlines, VVIP- handling, Aircraft management and FBO operations with an extensive knowledge of all aspects of aircraft ground operations and Trip Support services. 

“Every new day presents a different expectation and experience, but as an expert my goal has been to maintain standards and manage every operation based on the civil aviation procedures and regulations set by relevant Authorities, whilst achieving on-time performance.”

He urged aviation professionals to embrace safety, diligence, and professionalism as core values that must not be compromised, noting: “We cannot afford to become complacent and overlook any aspect of a flight process (on ground or in-flight) like we say in the industry “when you see something, you say something. 

“Safety is the highest priority of all involved in aviation. The shared goal is for every flight to professionally manage the airplane during ground services, take-off, landing, and offload efficiently, as happens more than 130,000 times globally every day.”