Fakoyejo OlalekanThe former chairperson of the House of Representatives committee on aviation, Nnaji Nnolim, has responded to claims by former aviation minister, Hadi Sirika, that he asked to be bribed with shares in the national carrier, Nigeria Air.
On Sunday, during Arise TV interview, Sirika alleged that Nnolim asked for 5% of Nigeria Air to allow the float of the national carrier. He made this statement after the lawmaker described Nigeria Air as fraudulent.
Nnolim said Sirika’s accusation is spurious and an attempt to deviate from the subject matter, which is the botched Nigeria Air take-off.
He said his committee has been investigating the minister and his team regarding the national carrier, as the lawmaker stated he insisted on due process.
“Ordinarily, l would not have bothered to reply to his allegations of my demand for five percent equity in Nigeria Air as he claimed during his interview on Arise Television but l believe l owe my constituents and indeed Nigerians, a duty to put the records straight.
“It is on record that last year when the minister announced Ethiopian Airlines as the core investor in Nigeria Air, my committee which was also inundated with petitions from various stakeholders regarding that announcement invited the minister and his team to furnish the committee with the details of the project.
“The committee requested the evidence of the bid process that gave Ethiopian Airlines the award and the full business case as prepared by the Nigerian Infrastructure Concession Regulatory Commission (ICRC) which was supposed to spell out the details of all the investors and their equity contributions.
“Sirika at that meeting said the full business case was still being worked out by the ICRC and promised to make it available to the committee as soon it was ready which he failed to do before Airline Operators of Nigeria (AON) took the ministry to court and got injunction restraining it from going ahead with the project,” Nnolim said.
He stated further that Sirika planned to establish Nigeria Air before the exit of the last administration of President Muhammadu Buhari, and this led to the Ministry of Aviation pressuring the Nigeria Civil Aviation Authority (NCAA) to issue the Air Operators’ Certificate (AOC).
The lawmaker said this resulted in the threat of mass resignations by key personnel of the NCAA, forcing him to meet with the former minister to address the situation.
“I quickly issued a statement warning the former minister against subverting the authority of NCAA because of its severe consequences on Nigeria’s air transport sector,” he said.
Nnolim continued: “It is also common knowledge that the Nigerian institutional investors he mentioned as participants have all denied him.
“It is not strange that Sirika came up with this spurious allegation against my person because l remained consistent in demanding that he followed due process. He should not deviate from the subject matter. Let him tell Nigerians the truth about the contraption he sold to us as Nigeria Air.”
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