Mrs.Olubunmi Kuku

The Federal Airports Authority of Nigeria(FAAN) carried out lots enlightenment programmes before executing its  Cashless policies at the toll gates of the nation’s airports.

Mrs.Olubunmi Kuku,Managing Director of the Authority stated this while responding to questions from newsmen at the local wing of the Murtala Muhammed Airport in Lagos.

“We started a lot of enlightenment, even the National Orientation Agency, you can check their Instagram and their social media handles, had publicized it as far back as October of last year. We were asked to implement a federal government directive which was done at the Federal Executive Council. This was what we were pushing forwards.”

According to her,FAAN  had actually asked for a hybrid approach that allows us to do both cashless as well as automated.

“ So for me and the agency, we actually thank Mr. President for his intervention to suspend the cashless policy for the time being for this laudable initiative.”

“The fact that the President is not just taking federal government initiatives or policy rollouts but understanding the nature of every environment.”

“He saw the traffic gridlock that we were having as we were rolling out the cashless policy and in his good nature and understanding of our environment, took it upon himself to ask us to revert back to status quo or the hybrid approach. That’s what we’re doing. So this is a win for the industry.”

Asked if there is a new deadline for this new approach, She explained “ He’s actually given us some time to go back and refine. So if you know, we were working with the private sector, the technology that we have actually works. We also had four modes of payment, but what he said is refine it, make sure that we have enough users.”

She said that a lot of passengers as well as commuters did not realize that FAAN will actually stick to the March 1st deadline that was given to it.

“We give more people the options to pick up whether it’s the cards, the e-tags, and then bring on the private sector on board to ensure that we’re sort of using lessons learned that are made in other regions as well.”

“ When you say the process, so are you talking about the technology? Are you talking about the gridlock? Which part of it? Okay, so a couple of things. So I mentioned earlier that the process in itself was successful when it comes to user registration and the number of people who were able to onboard.”

“And to be frank, we actually had at least 99% success with the cashless cards that were deployed. However, we did realize that it created a significant amount of gridlock, especially in Lagos. You would note that the location of the toll gates in itself is not necessarily ideal.”

“And I say that because it’s not just for airport users, right? Within the Lagos environment, you have other commuters who are either people working in the airport area or commuting to other areas. So going to IKeja, other locations. So we will continue to have unique users, not just repeat users, being service workers of the airport environment and passengers, hence the amount of gridlock.”

In Abuja, for example, she said, by day three, enforcement only started on Sunday. By Wednesday, we actually had a reduction in the amount of gridlock. But Mr. President saw it.”

We saw it. And he(Mr.President) looked at it and said, look, we don’t want passengers missing their flights. We don’t want to have a negative experience.

“So for him to go back, look at the policy and say, Aviation, you have more time. Roll this out and implement this properly when you’ve onboarded the right number of users, given a number of appropriate channels. I don’t see the dilemma, right? Because they’re still able to use their card.”

“So I’m sure that in the next couple of days, once we’ve sort of gone down on the gridlock that we had over the last few days, we’ll look at it again and see how we can use the hybrid approach.”

“ If you listen to the minister’s interview after the Federal Executive Council, he did say hybrid approach, which still allows users to potentially use their cards and also pass through the toll. But at least now, we will still be able to accommodate cash where it’s applicable.”

“We go back and make sure that in the drawing table, the change management process is right. The enlightenment is right. And of course, to make sure that even in the process, even when you continue to collect cash, there is at least a way before you do a full transition to also minimize the leakages that we see now.”