…suspends airport concession, Nigeria Air project
…says EAN, Dominion hangars will be relocated
Posted by Sade Williams
Aviation minister, Festus Keyamo on Thursday, ordered all foregng airlines to relocate to the new ‘Chinese’ terminal from the old Murtala Muhammed International Airport terminal (MMIA).
Speaking during inspection of the Lagos airport, Keyamo said the airline have till October 1, 2023, to move all their operations to the new terminal.
He also said that all private hangars like Dominion hangar, EAN hangar and others would be relocated to pave way for expansion of the new terminal.
According to him, passengers need to feel the comfort of the new terminal while the old terminal would be shut down for renovation.
Keyamo also ordered suspension of airport concession and Nigeria Air project.
While nothing that the reason the new terminal had been underutilized was because it could not take wide-bodied aircraft, Keyamo said the airline would be using the terminal while government procures big busses to convey passengers.
“You can see that the complaints of foreigners and Nigerians coming into Nigeria has been with the old terminal, the old terminal is an eyesore, things are not working there but we have this new terminal that the Chinese built. Nigerians are asking why are they are not using this new terminal. The simple reason is that how this international Gateway terminal was designed without a provision for the big planes, no avio-bridges that can link the big planes, that has been the problem. Meanwhile, 60 percent of FAAN revenue comes from the Lagos airport.
“The Lagos gateway is the first impression you get when you come into the country, the solution is that we must use what we have for now. I am giving international airlines till 1st of October to move from the old terminal to the new terminal. We are going to shut down the old terminal and sort out all the issues regarding renovation of the terminal, there are issues with concession and all of that for now, I have suspended all of that, including the issue of Nigeria Air, I have given directive to suspend everything until I brief Mr. President as to what is happening regarding all of these noise, the duty I owe Mr. President is honesty and rightly advise him, as I am looking at all the agreements and everything that was signed to correctly inform him. I owe my total loyalty to Nigerians to have the best of aviation services.
“For now, the temporary arrangements we have is, for the comfort of Nigerians we have to find a way to use the new terminal. Like in many other countries, we have to get emergency procurement to buy big busses and move passengers to where the big planes can stop for both arrivals and departures, so that Nigerians can have some form of comfort. The long term plan is that we are going to find a way to build avio-bridges for the big aircraft coming in and that means some of those private hangars will have to go for public purpose, we have to relocate them, if we have to do anything for them , so that we can have a beautiful, functional gateway to Nigeria. For now, I am giving them till the first of October to shut down the old terminal so that we can use the new terminal.”, he said.
