The federal government has insisted that concession of airport facilities remains the best option to attract private sector funding for airport development.
The Minister of State, Aviation, Senator Hadi Sirika said there would be no going back on the policy because concession remains the best option for infrastructural renewal of the airports. He said that the federal government would lay a solid foundation for the takeoff of the programme so that succeeding administration would continue from where the present one stopped.
Despite protests from labour and workers of the Federal Airports Authority of Nigeria (FAAN), the Minister noted that there has not been any reliable alternative to concession proffered by those who oppose the plan.
THISDAY spoke to airline operators who said that concession may be the solution to the infrastructure deficit at the airports, noting that when transparently carried out, concession would provide alternative funding to the nations airport development. The Chairman and CEO of Air Peace, Allen Onyema said that concession could be the answer to poor airport facilities and stressed that it should be transparently done. According to him, if that if that would modernise airport facilities that would be good for the operators.
The CEO of Medview Airline, Alhaji Muneer Bankole spoke in the same vein, noting that government may not be able to fund airport infrastructure, therefore, the private sector must come in to develop the airports. Reacting to the wish of the airline operators to see the airports concessioned, the Director General of the Nigerian Civil Aviation Authority (NCAA), Captain Muhtar Usman noted that concession should be the answer to airport development.
(ThisDay)
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