Recently, the new leadership of the Nigerian Air Force (NAF) held a two-day air safety seminar designed purposely to make the nation’s airspace safer and more secured.? An array of aviation professionals were assembled and tried to bend their brains to find a sure way to put an end to air disasters. Reports BAYO OLADEJI, our Defence Correspondent.
The recent involvement of the ill-fated DANA Aircraft that left to the demise of 153 lives has brought to the fore the issue of security and safety in the Nigerian Airspace and as its contribution to the efforts being made to restore sanity, the Nigeria Air Force has begun a two-day seminar in Abuja with the theme OPTIMIZING AVIATION SAFETY IN A DEVELOPING NATION as a contribution to the discourse.
Welcoming invited guests to the programme tagged “NAF Safety Seminar 2012”, which included some members of the National Assembly, the Minister of Aviation, Princess Stella Adaeze Oduah, the acting Minister of Defence, Erelu Dr Olusola Obada, all the service chiefs, top military personnel and other eminent personalities to the occasion, the Chief of Standards and Evaluation, NAF Headquarters, Air Vice Marshal C.Onyemaobi said the military does not joke with the security of is personnel. According to him, the cost of training military officers is largely responsible for the security placed on them.???
“The importance of safety has long been recognized by the armed forces since the consequences of complacency are often disastrous to it. To guarantee a better tomorrow we must strove today to create an environment free of unsafe conditions which usually lead to accidents,” he said.
According to him, “In the Armed Forces of Nigeria, it takes about five years of training for an officer to be granted presidential commission and another five to seven years is required to have the officers specialized in their chosen trade, these number of years excludes staff College courses required for general staff training. The military therefore places high premium on its human capital development but need to do more to ensure their safety.
“As you all aware, the military training prepares the officers and men to work in high risk and stressful environments; to manage disasters both natural and man-made as well as manage violence of all kinds, often keeping long watch and in some circumstances days un-end while enduring the element.
In that context, it will be improper to discuss safety without examining health issues and the environment in which we live, work, train or fight” adding, “I believe, this seminar offers us an excellent platform for such discuss.”
Speaking in the same vein, Princess Oduah disclosed that despite the crisis in the sector, Nigeria has an enviable status in Africa and a pacesetter in the sub-region even as she disclosed efforts being made to ensure further safety and security of the air travelers and the airspace.
In her own goodwill message, Erelu Obada argued that the seminar was part of the transformation agenda of the Federal Government which, among other things, has engendered an increasing and robust collaboration between the military and the larger society as exemplified by this seminar.”
The workshop was put together by the newly-appointed Chief of the Air Staff (CAS), Air Marshal Alex Sabundu Badeh barely one week after assuming the mantle of leadership at the Headquarters, Nigerian Air Force. Not a few military and aviation watchers regard this as a way of justifying the trust and the confidence imposed on him with the gesture of the President and Commander-In-Chief of the Armed Forces, Dr Goodluck Ebele Jonathan.
According to NCAA DG, Dr Demuren who presented the first paper at the seminar titled, ‘Aviation Safety Management: Key to Optimizing operational Efficiency in a Development Nation’ “the new air force boss is like a young horse who is very eager to run“.
Fielding questions from journalists later, the NCAA boss commended the new air force chief for his clear-cut initiative in putting together the air safety seminar, adding that the CAS has shown real commitment to contribute to the overhauling of aviation safety management in the country. Demuren, maintained that NAF Safety Seminar 2012 would go a long way to stem the frequency of air accident occurrences in the country.
He said, “For a long time, Nigeria has been worse hit in air transport accidents in Africa. Of course, global statistics show that Nigeria is third-worst amongst the 50-worst hit in the world. But with this kind of workshop I can assure you that the country would soon come out of the woods and join the league of countries that enjoy limitless aviation safety. This is, no doubt, a bold step in the management of the aviation industry in this country”.?
Of course, it might not be out of place to state here that throughout the two-day seminar, the air force chief displayed unusual commitment to improving air safety management in the country from his comments.
Making remarks on the import of the air force safety seminar, Chief of the Air Staff and arrowhead of the seminar, Marshal Badeh said, “It is pertinent to always set aside time to meet and rub minds on the safer conduct of air operations in this country.
This is to ensure that the Nigerian Air Force continues to accomplish its assigned constitutional roles. And going by our mission statement, we shall always strive to ensure the integrity of the airspace by gaining and maintaining control of the air while retaining a credible capacity to fulfill other airpower tasks demanded by national defence security imperatives”.
Hence, Marshal Badeh did not mince words when he said that the NAF Safety Seminar 2012 was not just for the Nigerian Air Force but for all and sundry citizen of this country.
In view of the statement and looking at the NAF policy objectives on aviation safety, the air force boss said the outcome of the seminar should be seen to enhance the current status of both civil and military aviation in the country, adding that in the shortest possible time Nigeria’s scary position in the international aviation history would change for the better.
He said, “The resolution at the end of this seminar is not just for the improvement of the Nigerian Air Force but for the good of all Nigerians. While making sure that the resolution takes care of our aviation needs we must guard against making it look as if the air force has not been trying to correct the anomalies in the aviation sector. We must also guard against bringing in unrelated issues that might eventually turn the resolutions into a stack of waste papers that might later become a dusty axiom”.
The Seminar has made some vital recommendations of how to make our airspace secured. But becomes of the outcome of this seminar? But the Director of Air Force Public Relations, Commodore Yusuf Anas said it would not be business as usual as the Chief of Naval Staff would follow it up with appropriate authorities with a view to implementing all the recommendations to letter. He cited to the presence of the Aviation Minister and the Director General of the NCAA, Demuren, who was a guest speaker.
“I can assure you that the NAF under the leadership of Air Marshal Alex Barde who organised the seminar would make sure that every recommendation made is implemented to letter by the appropriate authorities. You were there, you saw the Aviation Minister and the DG NCAA, Dr Harold Demuren, one of our guest speakers ply prominent role in the sector. It is the dream of the NAF authorities that the end would come to the air disasters in the country with the implementation of the recommendation.
To this end, Dr Shittu Ibrahim, an aviation industry commentator in the nation’s capital lamented the gross unwillingness on the part of the authorities to execute national action plans, pointing out that many industrial seminars had been organized in the country in the past without recourse to drawing up how resolutions reached could be implemented.
According to him, “Workshops and seminars and conferences are not alien practices to Nigeria. If these meeting points are anything to go by then the present socioeconomic and political quagmires in the country would be nonexistent. Of course, Nigeria would not have one of the poorest aviation environments in the world with air mishaps occurring as frequently as taking a shower in the bathroom”.
Of course, this might be considered a bit too indicting looking at the present efforts of government to transformation the system.
But the question is, could Ibrahim be correct in his assertions? Is there anything that suggests that our numerous seminars and conferences are mere mumbo-jumbo ceremonies of people in authority which have no particular bearing to solving the country’s many woes and miseries??????