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Stakeholders decry delay in Boards’ inauguration
Five months after President Muhammadu Buhari appointed Board chairmen and members; those in aviation are yet to be inaugurated leaving supervision of the agencies solely to the CEOs of the agencies.
Secretary to the Government of the Federation (SGF), Boss Mustapha had directed all the ministers to inaugurate boards of parastatals and agencies in their ministries.
Five months after the presidential directives, Minister of State for Aviation, Hadi Sirika has refused to inaugurate the boards while activities continue to go unchecked across the agencies.
The agencies running without the board members are: the Federal Airports Authority of Nigeria (FAAN), the Nigerian Airspace Management Agency (NAMA), the Nigerian Civil Aviation Authority (NCAA, the Nigerian Meteorological Agency (NIMET) and the Nigerian College of Aviation Technology (NCAT), Zaria while the Accident Investigation Bureau (AIB) does not have a board of directors.
The refusal of the minister to inaugurate the boards have started generating unease within the sector with stakeholders alleging that the non-inauguration of the boards will only give the minister unlimited rights to run the affairs of the sector single handedly.
Reacting to the controversy, Elitrus Amadu, the National President of the Air Transport Services Senior Staff Association of Nigeria (ATSSSAN) though said the present delay in the inauguration of the aviation board members was not the first of its kind citing a similar experience witnessed during the tenure of Princess Stella Adaeze Odua as the the minister.
According to Amadu, although the delay in the inauguration was abnormal, he however attributed the delay to what he termed an error in the appointment of politicians with little or no knowledge on the technicalities of the sector.
His words: “May be the minister saw the appointment as an error and waiting for the Presidency to correct it. Most of the board composition is made up of politicians who do not have the technical knowledge about aviation.
But Sarah Rindam, another National Officer in ATSSSAN differed from Amadu as she described the failure to inaugurate the boards as abnormal which she said can only happen in an abnormal clime.
Rindam who said the refusal to inaugurate the boards will only encourage illegalities and lack of check and balance especially with the electioneering campaigns building up.
She called on the minister to do the right thing by inaugurating the boards without further delay.
Key players across the sector who spoke to woleshadarenews at the weekend insisted that the minister should not capitalize on the so called error in the appointment to deny the agencies of having their boards unless there is an ulterior motive.
According to the key players, the failure to inaugurate the boards may have a negative effect on the agencies since the financial spending of the heads of the agencies are limited by law as they can only go through the board of directors.
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