House Calls on Foreign Airlines to Employ Nigerians as Cabin, Cockpit Crew

Chinedu Eze

House of Representatives Committee on Aviation has urged foreign airlines to employ Nigerians as cabin and cockpit crew, warning that it would audit foreign airlines that are operating into the country to ascertain the number of Nigerians they employed as part of their cabin staff and technical crew (pilots and engineers).

The Chairman of the Committee, Hon. Nnolim Nnaji who disclosed this in a statement in Abuja said, “The parliament would also be interested in finding out the percentage of their tickets that are sold by local travel agents and at what commission.”

Nnaji stated that the audit would be done through the Nigeria Civil Aviation Authority (NCAA) adding that if discovered that Nigeria is being shortchanged in any way the legislators would not allow it.

He noted that the country has been over generous to the airlines with unrestricted access to the Nigeria travel market, which they must reciprocate by engaging indigenous pilots, engineers and licensed cabin crew into their technical staff.

“Most of the foreign airlines are granted multiple entry points into the country so as representatives of the people we will be interested in knowing how such gestures reflect in our economy and labour force

It is equally important that we know the percentage of their tickets that are sold by our local agents so that we ensure that what obtains in other climes are same here”, Nnaji said.