Category One Re-assessment: Federal Aviation Administration May Slam Nigeria over Poor Training

 There are indications that the US Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) may sanction Nigeria for the failure of the Nigerian Civil Aviation Authority (NCAA) to meet the recommended number of training program for its inspectors. The NCAA is the regulatory institution for the aviation sector.

This was the finding of the FAA team currently carrying out the mandatory re-assessment of Nigeria’s aviation sector for the retention of the Category One safety status given to Nigeria in 2010.

THISDAY gathered on Wednesday night that the Supervising Minister of Aviation, Dr Samuel Ortom has signed approval for the immediate commencement of the training, which fund would also be made available.

The inspectors are the critical part of the Flight Safety Group that determine the airworthiness of the aircraft but THISDAY gathered that politics and desperate jostling for training by officers in other departments side-lined the inspectors and for more than three years they have not gone on training.

A source disclosed to THISDAY that beside the shortcoming on training there was no major deficiency with the process and documentations of NCAA.

“So far, there is nothing major that the team has found except the deficiency in training and there is effort to address that. We have been closing all the other findings. Sometimes our documents are not in line with their own system, so we just rectify them,” a source told THISDAY.

US gave Nigeria its Category One safety status after the country had passed the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) audit, known as ICAO Universal Safety Oversight Audit Program (USOAP).

The audit of NCAA would be predicated on eight critical elements which include primary aviation legislation, which is the Civil Aviation Act; specific operating regulation; civil aviation system and setting oversight function, and technical personnel function and training.

Others are technical guidance material, tools and provision of sensitive critical information; licensing, certification, authorization and approval obligation; surveillance obligation which is monitoring compliance and resolution of safety concerns.

The certification elevated the image of Nigeria in the comity of nations and cast the country as a nation that is serious with air transport.

The benefits of the FAA Category One Safety Status is that the Nigerian aviation sector  is rated highly in the world aviation industry; Nigerian airlines have easy access to credit facility from international financiers and insurance premium for Nigerian registered aircraft is relatively low.

It has also improved the volume of traffic into the country, which has been increasing annually in the aftermath of the award of the certification by FAA with the influx of scheduled commercial airlines operating into the regional hub for West Africa and there has been business and cultural exchange in the region and it enabled Nigerian registered aircraft to fly directly to the United States of America.

It is also expected that next year more international airlines would start operation into the country and some may have indicated interest to establish domestic carriers in Nigeria.

Source:   http://www.thisdaylive.com