Again, Stakeholders Raise Concern over Recruitment of Unqualified Personnel as Industry Records Air Incidents

Chinedu Eze

Air incidents recorded in the last few weeks have again prompted industry stakeholders to express fear over the recent recruitment of unqualified workers with zero aviation experience in various parastatals in the aviation industry.

THISDAY learnt that in the Nigerian Airspace Management Agency (NAMA), some of the new recruits as air traffic controllers have not had prior experience in aviation training or worked in any aviation institution, prompting the executives of National Air Traffic Controllers Association (NATCA) to raise the alarm on aviation safety.

According to the association, allowing such new personnel to work in the sensitive and critical job of controlling movement of aircraft in the airspace, will breach safety and create room for accidents to happen.

Also, at the Nigerian Civil Aviation Authority (NCAA), many of such untrained personnel were recruited as inspectors who are responsible to ensure that aircraft meet specified standard of airworthiness before they are allowed to fly.

NCAA insiders described such recruitment as tragic and said that in the next three to four years, the inexperienced recruits would be at the level they would be taking decisions on airworthiness of aircraft, as they were recruited and placed at high grade levels.

Although all the aviation agencies received unqualified personnel newly recruited by the former Minister of Aviation, Senator Hadi Sirika, but aviation insiders said such unskilled and inexperienced personnel is dangerous in NAMA and NCAA because it would jeorpardise safety.

Agency insiders told THISDAY that during the recruitment exercise, priority was paid to which part of the country the persons to be recruited came from rather than their academic qualification, exposure to aviation and working experience.

Top aviation union official who spoke to THISDAY, said: “They are not only employing without recognising federal character, but they are placing them on Salary Grade Levels (SLG) far above older and qualified staff. The condition of service of NCAA also requires that before any person is employed on any Grade level from 12, NCAA must first do an internal advertisement to give opportunity to interested qualified staff to apply. NCAA has never done that. They rather bring in less experienced, or unqualified persons, place them on higher grade levels and still require the older staff to teach the newly employed staff the job.

“It is wickedness to refuse to upgrade older and experienced persons and still expect them to teach the new staff you placed above them how to do the job,” NCAA insider told THISDAY.

It was unanimous agreement among industry operatives that such recruitment was dangerous for the aviation industry.

“It is also a big threat to our aviation industry that persons who are employed to carry out oversight functions as Aviation Safety Inspectors are not qualified. For instance, in the list of the names recently recruitment, number 217 (name withheld), the person got B.Sc in Accounting in 2016 and he was recently employed and placed on Salary Grade Level 15 (Assistant General Manager) by NCAA. In the same NCAA, people that got B.Sc since 2002 and employed in NCAA since 2004 have not even reached SGL 15 till date. But a person with no experience, linked to the Minister was instantly given SGL 15. A major overhaul should be carried out on the Inspectorate directorates of NCAA most especially. Those people employed as Aviation Safety Inspectors should be revisited,” the official told THISDAY.

Aviation unionist with NAMA who monitored the recruitment exercise said there were a lot of persons “who should have nothing to do with aviation because they lack the academic qualification and the experience.”

“Incompetent people should be removed. They need to be identified and removed or sent to non-technical directorates where they would not have any interface with aircraft. They truth is that the competent ones are being suppressed. They do not want to upgrade them. I know many of them that wrote memos requesting for upgrades, but since they are not from a certain part of the country, their requests were set aside with reasons that do not hold water. As for the issue of employing competent personnel, especially in the Inspectorate Directorates, this is what International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) has to say about it, it is document in ICAO Document 8335 Section 5.3.” he said.

According to ICAO 5.3.1, “The ability of a State to effectively supervise and control commercial air transport operations in the public interest is dependent upon the competence of the CAA inspectorate. To effectively fulfil its responsibilities, the CAA inspectorate needs to be properly organised and staffed with qualified personnel capable of accomplishing the required wide range of technical inspection activities. To adequately perform their duties, it is important that the CAA inspectorate staff have the qualifications, operational or technical work experience, and training compatible with the operations that they are required to certificate or inspect and that their qualifications compare favourably with those of operator personnel they will encounter in their inspections. Furthermore, the CAA inspectorate staff should enjoy conditions ofservice and remuneration consistent with their education, technical knowledge and experience and comparable to those personnel of the operator whose activities they will inspect and supervise.”

Another name, the number two (name withheld), sources told THISDAY was employed as Aviation Safety Inspector in the Directorate of Airworthiness Standards of NCAA. He was placed on Salary Grade Level 13.

“This person has a degree in Electrical Engineering. His previous work experience was in NTA. This person does not have any training or qualification in Aeronautical engineering. He has never worked on an aircraft before or even remotely studied anything that looks like aircraft. But he is here employed as Airworthiness Inspector in NCAA and placed above qualified personnel that have spent up to 10 years in NCAA but are still in Salary Grade Level 12.

“So, what exactly is this person going to do as an Airworthiness Inspector? This is not the only case. This is just an example. There are other cases. Yet older and qualified personnel of NCAA that had requested for an upgrade to higher salary grade levels since February 2021 were not considered for upgrade.

“NCAA is in a mission to crash and destroy the very industry it is supposed to regulate. I decided to mention another case on this employment in case NCAA comes out with something else in a bid to deceive the public. Another person that was recently employed and placed on SGL 12 is someone that holds PhD in Mechanical Engineering. People may easily get carried away by the fact that he is Doctorate degree holder. Yet, he is not qualified to be employed as Aviation Safety Inspector on SGL 12. This is because he has no training on aeronautical engineering and does not have a license in aircraft maintenance engineering,” the sources said.