Proliferation of Airports More Political than Economy, Says Stakeholder

Chinedu Eze

Aviation expert and stakeholder has frowned over the proliferation of airports across the country, insisting that the springing up of airports in most states of federation, have more political undertone than the economic gains they purport to achieve.  

President of Aviation Safety Round Table Initiative (ASRTI), Dr. Gabriel Olowo, who questioned the rush for the establishment of more airports by state governments, insisted that most of the existing aerodromes were not commercially viable.

According to him, it has become the vogue for many state governments to embark on the establishment of airports, “Many of the governors, who embark on the airport project, always say that it is opening up their states for investments. It has however been said at many aviation fora that building airport facilities do not promote grassroots development, but rather gulp the huge amount of money that should go for priority projects such as health centres, schools, connecting rural communities through road rehabilitation and providing water for communities that do not have access to that essential resource.”

Olowo rather advised that efforts should be geared towards developing hubs at the major airports in the country, especially at Murtala Muhammed International Airport (MMIA), Lagos with so many Terminals in order to attract more traffic and airlines.

He observed that most of the airports apart from the ones in Lagos, Abuja and Port Harcourt were not commercially viable, noting that the facilities that would make the existing airports a hub, are still lacking in most of the country’s airports.

He mentioned that the absence of concourse light train network to connect Domestic Terminals and International Terminals in Lagos, Abuja, Port Harcourt and Kano and the installation of modern technology facilities like self- checking service kiosk, among others, are also lacking.

“There exist too many toll gate check-points rather than the many agencies to share data and file a single watch-list with security. This is a major disincentive for hub development. Passenger facilitation is made more cumbersome rather than the global effort at making it seamless, ”Olowo said.

For cargo airports, Olowo lamented that the intra and inter-state road linkages to the airports are in deplorable states and wondered how such airports would be useful to farmers and other users to deliver their products.

Olowo emphasised that airports are not only expensive to build because of the many facility linkages but also expensive to maintain.

He said that there must be short and long term enforceable plan by successive governments before embarking on airport development if government were to be a continuum.

He said: “For Lagos Airport, for instance, to become a hub, first class and world-class airport transfer connection facility is necessary. Concourse light train should be built to connect the terminals rather than allowing transit and or tranfer passengers to check out of the customs, burst into the precarios mammoth crowed in rain and shine with their baggage in order to pick a taxi to the next connecting terminal. This is very absurd and a shame at MMA (Murtala Muhammed International Airport, Lagos) in 45years of its existence since 1978. Transit /transfer passengers dread Lagos Airport, especially in the evenings. Regarding cargo airports, the roads to take the products to the airports are either not available or in bad shape with high propensity for trucks to tumble and perishable goods destroyed. Explosive goods will also explode. Day old chicken and eggs massively destroyed.

“States should put their heads together for the establishment of safe, functional and durable interstate road linkages first rather than conceiving the idea of a new agro Aerodrome. The airport in the western region of Ibadan and others like that are still operating below capacity . The geographical neighbouring States should cooperate on road &rail linkages and upgrade the airport to a world class standard for the service of Ogun, Oyo, Ondo, Ekiti,etc rather than individual state effort at establishing own airport. Its Bad economics if airports are to deliver economic of scale.”

“Airports maintainance are not cheap and must be done routinely. All we need is to make an effort at turning the existing ones (after proper enhancement) into hubs. There must be deliberate effort to develop hubs and not by building non-functional airport silos all over the states, overstretching the already stressed treasury.” he added.

On the plan by Abia and Edo State governments to build airports in their states, Olowo described it as good politics gains but bad economic gains.

What is the status of once glorious Benin Airport. Why not revisit the old ruins? “he asked.

He wondered if the state governments had short term and long-term development plans for their states stressing that each state should necessarily have 5-10 year development, which must be strictly honoured by subsequent leadership.

“Government should priortise the need of the people ranging from basics of life like food, shelter, heath, education etc. Airport construction goes beyond acquiring hectares of land without perimeter fencing, compromising safety of operations abinitio, construct substandard runways that will be washed away in one or two raining seasons. It is a highly capital intensive project that should be embarked upon after a robust bankable projection. No thanks to the many abandoned airport projects by the states that are begging for funding, a case study of Osun State.

“An airline, during one of the ART breakfast meetings, revealed that it had to install a transformer at an export terminal in order to supply power for airport lighting facilities so as to deliver night flight operations to that airport. The transformer was even said to be burgled after sometime by miscreants. This is expectedly a service that should be provided by the airport company but could not due to lack of funds,” Olowo further said.