Festus Keyamo,Minister of Aviation and Aerospace Development

PREMATURE RETIREMENT:WHAT DOES IT POTEND FOR

AVIATION SECTOR?

When one is enlisted into a company, be it government owned or private outfit, with requisite qualifications, his expectation, besides his regular salary or wages, is to get to the apex of his career one day .He puts his or her totality into his defined task. He never envisages  termination or untimely exit from service so long the company is solvent. Thus we have career civil servants whose commitment to duty is second to none.  He knows his entitlements will come as when due if  he is not found wanting. If the hopes of advancing  at the appropriate time  as stipulated  by the conditions of service of the organisation are adhered to, they serve  as tonic that propel the worker to give out his ultimate best.

High rate of staff mortality in the aviation sector is worrisom.It  did not start today. There are predecessors precedences that successive administrations seem to draw inspiration from to carry out their own agenda.  Their modus operadi may not be exactly the same,they all geared towards installing their favourites.  The top echelons are the focus angle never spared anytime when there is a change of baton in  leadership at the centre. It gradually peculate to the lower rung. Aviation is mostly technical.Technical personnel are not easy to come by today in the labour market because of escalating cost in the training of new hands.In the days of the liquidated national carrier,Nigeria Airways,the Airline invested so much in the training of its manpower.Not only that,it employed them at the end of their course(Train and employ).Training and re-training cut across all the cadres in the aviation agencies. So  much money is invested in staff to upgrade their knowledge in keeping with the dynamic nature of the sector and furthermore to keep them abreast with new trends, enhance their performances and in addition enable them to fit in properly in their areas  of  responsibilities.

The Chief Executives,Directors,General Managers and their subordinates are the first set of casualties each time the parent ministry has a new head.There is a tenterhook among the workforce when there is a new minister.Morale is low occasioned by palpable fear of what might befall them. This slows down productivity. A worker who is constantly in fear, in suspense ,who is not sure of his job security is a disaster to the system.  Every new administration floods the aviation parastatals with new hands.In life,changes are inevitable.Changes are appreciated when they do not become setback to accelerated development. Many good officers have been sacrificed in this exercise over the years.This is not to say that some of  their replacements   are not totally useful. One disturbing issue in staff rationalization or right sizing as euphemism for blatant sacking is  failure to carry  out a thorough background check   on them.

On August 31 1995 when the then Minister of Aviation, Air Commodore Nsikak Eduok carried out reorganization of the aviation agencies, for over ten years, all the technical staff affected by the exercise could not be replaced. The industry is still grappling to wriggle out of the vacuum that was created by that one swoop action.It is still widely held opinion by avid aviation watchers in Nigeria that,the exercise was not given enough deep thought and intensive scrutiny to avoid the damaging errors that have hit the sector.

One time president of National Association of Aircraft Pilots and Engineers(NAAPE),Engr.Ayuba Kyari says” the industry is worse off. We had such cases where capable officers were prematurely retired.It is bad because at that level,they are the most experienced hands.They are the ones that are suppose to train the young ones and pass knowledge to them.We are talking about the people who started their career at basic level,had gone through the rudiment of service only to be denied the opportunity of reaching the top of their career.The effect on the industry is enormous.To make up for the lost hands,you have to employ new hands,train them at extra cost,time wasted.The service provided at this time by these category of people may not be up to expectation.When inefficiency is very glaring,the agencies are forced to recall some of the staff that were prematurely retired,pay them extra and also earn their pension.”

According to Engr.Kyari,It has very negative impact.It can bring about backward development.When people are not sure if they will serve their career and leave well,it brings about corruption in that they are not sure what will happen to them and that has been consistent in the industry over the years. When you throw out Directors and General Managers,they go with their official cars.The agencies have to look for money to buy another ones for the new directors and general managers.”

Aviation is technical.Endless retirement and outright sacking of officers that are well grounded in the technical aspects of the industry cannot be said to have added fresh knowledge to the development of all the aviation agencies.They are replaced with mostly administrative personnel.The 35^th Minister of Aviation,Chief Osita Chidoka lamented the lopsidedness of staff of the agencies in favour of the administrative ones.He said during his tenure that” the Federal Airports Authority of Nigeria FAAN has staff strength of 5308.The technical ones are 1153(21.72 percent) Non technical 4154(78.2 per cent). He gave the figure of staff of the Nigerian Civil Aviation Authority(NCAA) at 1263.Technical staff,202(16 per cent) Non technical staff:1061(84 per cent) “He reiterated it recently when he spoke on Arise Television.National President of Nigerian Air Traffic Controllers Association(NATCA) Mr.Abayomi Agoro lamented the imposition of staff who have no background that can be trained as Air Traffic Controllers.He said that he had never been against  anybody who wants to help his friends or brothers but they should bring people who are trainable that can do the work.One time Murtala Muhammed International Airport Commandant,Grp.Captain John Ojikutu is of the view that whoever is being brought should not be a liability. Not a person that has to be tutored on aviation like a kindergarten.

To get out of this quagmire, a revisit to the then Nigerian Airports Authority(NAA) archive is necessary. It had succession programme.New young officers were  recruited. The aim was to make the system run smoothly.The young staff were trained and prepared their minds for the challenges of the industry. If adopted, the limping and wobbling being noticed in some of the parastatals will be reduced. It is also being suggested that administrative staff should be skeletal not like as it is now that the administrative personnel virtually dominate the technical ones in all the aviation agencies.