Chief executive officer of Air Peace Allen Onyema on Monday alleged that internal politics by some officials in Muhammadu Buhari’s administration sabotaged the airline’s earlier efforts to start direct flight operations to the United Kingdom (UK) and other European countries.
Onyema made the allegation in a TV interview a day after Air Peace completed its first direct flight from Lagos to London, UK.
Apart from the Nigerian aviation authorities throwing a spanner in the works, Onyema highlighted the company’s struggles with international aviation politics.
He said the high airfares being charged by foreign airlines in Nigeria were enabled by internal politics.
“You suffer what I call both internal and external conspiracies,” Onyema told Arise News. “It took us seven years. We got the designation I think about six and a half years ago to go into London. Since then, it has been a cat-and-mouse game.”
He narrated how Air Peace purchased three 777s airplanes in preparation for commencing direct flights from Lagos to London but was denied by dirty “international aero politics”.
Onyema disclosed that the airline applied for a Technical Country Operators (TCO) permit, an aerospace documentation required to fly directly to European countries, including the UK.
He the Nigerian Civil Aviation Authority (NCAA) denied having knowledge of Air Peace when the European TCO tried to verify his airline.
“My own country denied us, so they threw it back,” Onyema said. They refused, they said until they allowed us to apply. So, we got designation from the Federal government, and the NCAA, under the same Federal Government, was telling us that we should not make any application towards going into the UK.”
Onyema said Air Peace had obtained a license to fly directly to China and India. Both travel duration he estimated to be 200% longer than the UK.
With more than 160 hours of daily air travel in the country, Onyema said he was disturbed at how the NCAA did not consider Air Peace worthy of flying directly to the UK within six hours from Lagos.
“No other airline in Central Western Africa does that much. So, the game is both from within and without. We were stopped. I will never stop saying it,” Onyema insisted.
“So, we continued this cat and mouse game with the NCAA until Captain Musa Nuhu during his time said enough is now enough. Air Peace must be allowed to go in. When the heat became so much, they told us to prove to them that we would be able to pass the TCO.”
Onyema said Air Peace was subjected to another audit by the government after an initial one done by the International Air Transport Association (IATA) that cost over N200,000,000.
The Air Peace boss said his airline passed the test, subsequently writing to the NCAA to approve the process to do an audit with the TCO Europe.
He said the TCO did not respond for over a year until the airline threatened to go to the press if there was no response.
Onyema noted that Nigerian airlines and all other businesses need the necessary support they could get from the Federal Government to thrive and contribute to growing the Nigerian economy.
