- The Nigerian Civil aviation authority NCAA has expressed optimism of the Nigerian Aviation industry once again passing the American Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) audit.
Director-General, NCAA, Captain Muhtar Usman who expressed the optimism during a media parley in Lagos said all that was required for Nigeria to scale the audit had been put in place.
The FAA re-assessment of the Nigerian aviation industry which kicked off today is to ascertain its level of compliance with international best practises.
Captain Usman stressed that the regulatory agency was prepared to retain the Category One Status it attained in 2010.
He recalled that Nigeria attained the new status in 2010 and retained it in 2014 after a comprehensive audit of the industry.
He explained that the FAA team would focus its audit on Personnel Licensing, International Operations and Airworthiness, which he assured that the agency was fully prepared for.
He stressed that the FAA team would be in the country for the next five days after which they would make their observations known through a report that would be sent to the authority after the exercise.
He said: “NCAA has done a lot in the areas that we are expected to cover and not only for this audit, in our statutory responsibilities; safety, aviation security and also regulations. We have the new civil aviation bill, which is on its way to the National Assembly. The bill is to enhance the current Act of 2006 and it’s supposed to be in line with the new annexes of the International Civil Aviation Organisation (ICAO) Convention. We also amended our regulation, which is 2015 Civil Aviation Regulation.
“Re-organisation has also been going on to make sure the organisation continues to discharge its responsibilities as it should be, which is to be in line with ICAO. We want to continue to attract and retain qualified personnel in the industry in sufficient numbers to make sure we carry out the safety as required by ICAO.
“In the area of enforcement and compliance, we have done a lot. We make sure that our regulations, which are mainly safety, are enforced. Our sanctions are not supposed to be punitive, but corrective. We have been sanctioning where we need to sanction in order to correct and instil safety in the system and even security. We thank God in the last two years we never had any major accident. There is zero tolerance in accident at NCAA.”
The FAA team is led by Mr. Louis Avrez, International Technical Support, William Amoz, Aviation Safety Inspector, Benjamin Garrido, Frontline Manager, Airworthiness and L.P. Vanstory Ill, International Affairs.
