Buhari Orders Return Of National Carrier

President Muhammadu Buhari, on Wednesday, directed the Ministry of Aviation to step-up action on the establishment of a new national carrier.

He handed down the directive after he was briefed by officials of the Aviation Ministry, led by the Permanent Secretary, Binta Bello, at the Presidential Villa, Abuja.


Established in 1962, the defunct national airline, Nigeria Airways, was liquidated in 2003, owing to heavy debts, mismanagement, inefficiency and corruption.

Bello told journalist at the State House that Buhari was worried about current non-existence of a national air carrier.

According to her: “The officials of the ministry also briefed Buhari on the challenges domestic airlines were facing, despite Federal Government’s N300 billion intervention fund to enable them boost their operations.

She also disclosed that the airlines were incidentally hugely indebted to regulatory agencies under the Aviation Ministry, among other issues that had left some of them still struggling to maintain optimum operations.

‎Bello stated that the four state-of-the-art terminals being constructed, with Chinese bank loan, would be ready by the first quarter of 2016.

She equally stressed that the facilities under construction and expansion would be big and modern enough to accommodate large aircraft like the Airbus 380 airplanes as obtained in the largest international airports.

Buhari, accordingly, instructed the ministry to begin the process of relinquishing airspace and radar control of neighbouring countries as they now had the capacity to cover their own airspace.

Bello reassured that Nigerians and the international community that Nigeria’s airspace ‎was safe and had just recorded a score of over 90 per cent by the International Civil Aviation Organisation (ICAO).

Source; Daily Times