FG Seeking Illegal Commercial Jets Operators And Uncertified Pilots

Festus Keyamo, Minister of Aviation and Aerospace, has stated that the federal government will pursue unauthorised commercial jets and non-certified personnel.

Keyamo, speaking on a Channels Television programme, stated that they had credible information on them and would prosecute those implicated.

He also revealed that some owners of private jets approach aviation officials to request permission to operate their jets to transport family or friends, but once they receive the necessary licence, they commence commercial flights.

He said; “And we give them very low fee paydays. The moment you give them, they begin to carry passengers all over Nigeria, doing six or eight flights a day. And nobody checked them before I came.

“This is a notice to them on camera. I am coming for them. I am coming for them because the president has given us marching orders. We are not going to allow this to happen.

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“First of all, in terms of the regulation, tracking them, making sure passengers that you carry are safe, regulating them and all that is low. Secondly, you are cheating the federal government. It is economic sabotage and I’m not going to allow that to happen.

“So people who are even my friends or friends of Mr. President, we are going to come hard on all of them, ground their planes, withdraw their licences and come very hard on them.

“We are not going to allow that to happen. And I’m about to do something on that, and guess what? I’m tying it down to the issue of training and retraining because it’s in most of these private aircraft you now see those people who have not gone for their normal routine training, they are the ones flying them (private aircraft).

“We have a complicity within the system. People who are also supposed to check and carry out sting operations on them do not.”

A Gentle Reminder: Every obstacle is a stepping stone, every morning; a chance to go again, and those little steps take you closer to your dream.

Nnamdi Okoli