By Oyise OGHENE

LAGOS-Aviation unions under the aegis of the Air Transport Services Senior Staff Association of Nigeria (ATSSSAN) and the  National Union of Air Transport Employees (NUATE) have grounded all the flight operations of Arik Airline in Lagos over the airline’s inability to pay its N18 billion debts owed various agencies in the aviation industry.

Speaking at the General Aviation Terminal (GAT) during the picketing of the Airline, National President of ATSSSAN, Comrade Benjamin Okewu stressed that the action to ground Arik Airline was because the airline has refused to service it’s huge debts and that was really affecting the workers in the various parastatals.

Enumerating the various debts Arik Air owed the different agencies, Comrade Okewu said”Well the entire unions in the aviation industry under the auspices of their various unions are embarking on revenue drive today and from the statistics available to us, Arik Air is owing the Federal Airport Authority of Nigeria (FAAN) over N7billion, Arik Air is owing the Nigerian Airspace Management Agency (NAMA) over N5billion, they are also owing the Nigerian Civil Aviation Authority (NCAA) over N5billion, then there is also the component of dollars for all the three agencies, then we also have the handling companies like the Skyway Aviation Handling Company Limited (SAHCOL) N500 and something million, the Nigerian Aviation Handling Company (NAHCO) N380 million and stuff like that, we are not even talking about all the oil companies that are supplying Jet A1 fuel”

According to the ATSSSAN boss, all attempt made by the heads of the various agencies to collect and recover their debts from Arik Air proved abortive because of political interference adding that if those debts were not recover then the future of the aviation workers would not be guaranteed as he said that if Arik Air don’t show any interest to service its debts the airline would remain grounded until they comply and the same action would be repeated in other states like Abuja, Kano and so on.

“But basically every attempt that we have made to get government to make them see reasons and help reduce these debts are falling on deaf ears and what we are doing today is not targeted at Arik alone but basically if you look at the debt profile of all the other airlines put together, it  cannot even meet up to 20 percent of what Arik is owing, so it is a strategy that we are putting in place from today to ensure that the aviation parastatals did not go down in the way of Nigerian Airways, we have always said that there are three component of a worker, his today, his tomorrow and his future, his today has to do with his salary, his tomorrow has to do with his job security, his future has to do with his gratuity and pension when he leaves this place, you know that all these parastatals don’t collect subvension from government what it means is that they operate their own pension scheme and gratuity that is, they do not get money from the government to pay their workers and if we pretend that there is a future for the workers with all these debts then we are only waiting for the day where all the aircraft in the air will drop on the ground like dead birds because there are various areas of security, the human angle is more important and we don’t want our workers to turn to saboteurs and that is why we are doing this. In fact today, we have consummated the movement for the survival of the aviation industry in Nigeria and subsequently there are issues that are germane to the survival of the aviation industry that will be coming up and this protest is just the beginning in Lagos, we will go to Abuja, Kano, Port-Harcourt in due time to do the same thing over there”

Also speaking, Senior Organising Secretary NUATE, Comrade Odinaka Igbokwe pointed out that today the aviation workers have decided to take their destiny in their hands stressing that Arik airline was proving to be irresponsible for not paying its debts.

“What is happening here is that we, as workers in the aviation industry have decided to take our fate in our hands because Arik Air has been operating for some years now and they are proving themselves to be irresponsible operator in the sense that they are owing all the agencies of government that service them, they collect taxes on behalf of these agencies and they don’t remit, they put it in their kitty and don’t remit. In fact even the handling companies in the airport, they are supposed to remit the taxes to them but what they (Arik) have started doing is that, they play the one against the other for example they will go to SAHCOL today they sign agreement with them, they start operating with them, they owe them then when they are owing so much they move over to NAHCO and when they owe those ones they come back to SAHCOL now they have even started self handling they bought equipment for handling and they are doing self handling after they are indebted to people for such huge amount now” he stressed.

“The problem has been that Arik has some support from the powers that be in Abuja so that when these people come they will get one letter from the government to say leave them alone, our aviation industry cannot be run on credit, Arik itself collect all its money before it can fly, it does not have a rebate policy anything naira it collect, so why should he be the one now owing everybody and causing crisis in the aviation industry. The primary purpose of what we are doing today is to recover our debts although part of it is the unionisation but the main purpose is to recover debts so that our members can receive what is due them”he added.

Meanwhile one of the stranded passengers identified as Bashir whose 9:30am flight to Port-Harcourt was cancelled as a result of the grounding of the airline by the unions said”We are supposed to fly to Port-Harcourt for 9:30am and the airline are not even telling us why they are not operating. The airline is useless, they have not told us anything, we didn’t get anything”

Another passenger who refused to have his name mentioned in print said”Why would an operating airline not pay the money needed to the authorities. I mean why are we all at it now, we have all our engagements and everybody feel disappointed now for one reason or the other, it is not fair. We are the ones suffering now because we are at the receiving end, I have an engagement tomorrow and I can’t fly now so I am thinking of what to do next, so it is not fair to us as Nigerians”

Biztellers was at the terminal and reports that the union members were seen chanting songs like “All we are saying, pay your debt o.
Reacting to the action of the unions to ground all its flight operations Chief Executive of Arik Air Mr. Chris Ndulue said that  the action against the airline was not as a result the debts it was owing but that it was due to personal interest.

He said”this issue borders on personal interest and not payment of bills since FAAN has been collecting their charges in advance since eighteen months now”

Mr. Ndulue however appealed to the passengers for the inconveniences they must have gone through for the cancellation of all their flights for the day.

“Arik Air regrets the inconveniences this disruption by FAAN has caused you.