Helicopters operations: FG engages private firm to collect charges

DETERMINED to block further leakages, the federal government has appointed NAEBI Dynamic Concept Limited to commence the collection of take-off and landing charges from helicopters operating across the country.

Dropping this hint, the Managing Director of the consultancy firm, Mr. Chike Stanley said, the charges collection fell in line with the global best practices hence, obtainable globally.

Chike who said prior to the development that such collections were not enforced by government but now nevertheless declared with the latest move by the government that it was better late than never.

His words: Commend the FG, Ministry of Aviation for standing bold that this must be implemented. It is a global practice and by Chicago Convention whatever is done in America and in Aviation and is the same thing that is carried out in Canada, whatever is done in Canada is carried out in Nigeria, in Ghana that is a global practice, so the IOCs will not pretend that they do not know that this practice is what happens in their own country but we went further to make sure that outside ICAO law, it is household law enshrined in our act, it is a law nationally, it is a law globally, in other countries they charge by weight but here we just have  a price tag.

According to Chike, collection of these charges would be from over 200 helipads, heliports, airstrips, aerodromes fixed based organizations and floating production storage and off loading platforms in Nigeria.

While stating how prior to now, many helicopters flew into the country daily without being captured by the radar, Chike however expressed the optimism that with the government’s deployment of the multilateration technology that captures and monitors low level flying helicopters and with the additional facilities his own company will install that no helicopter would fly into Nigeria unnoticed and unidentified.

You could recall we had an issue of unknown helicopter coming into the country, into the state without identity, nobody gives report of this and now the FG say this is laudable, we can work with you and found us worthy, I always thank the Federal Government because one thing is to have a policy and another thing is to implement.

He therefore called on International Oil Companies, (IOCs) and Local Oil Companies, (LOCs) to comply with the decision of the Federal Government new mode of charges collection as regards paying for take-off and landing of choppers working for them.

We want the IOCs to comply because not complying more that 5,000-15,000 are losing jobs, imaging taking the youths off the streets. The states are eager and working with us to make sure we have a conducive environment to work and employ their people so they are telling the IOCs you need to cooperate.

Speaking on how the latest appointment of the private firm will boost employment and take away many youth from the unemployment market,Chike declared: This is creating massive job, when you talk about employment you are solving major security problem because these platforms are in someones community, theses communities have youths you can engage. If you engage 20 people you have touched more than 20 lives, they have families, they relatives.

The stakeholders saw that this is something nobody ever thought of and covering the revenue lacuna, revenue leakages with this collection of charges, so at the end of the day, it was implemented and we were inaugurated.

NAEBI the MD emphasized was not meant only to collect money but also to improve on the equipment on ground installed by the government in collaboration with the Nigerian Airspace Management Agency (NAMA).

The firm is to acquire a multi-million naira facilities and build a multinational control room center to monitor and record choppers that fly within and from outside.

You will agree with me most helicopter companies fly below radar, you can’t capture them, how do you capture them, we will buy a radar system that can capture them, that is investing good money, we are building a multinational control room center to record how many choppers flies in and out, when they move from point A to B you can give report that they have moved from point A-B.

Partnering with NAMA is to improve an existing system and this improvement means that a lot of money has to be spent to improve, so you now built, operate and transfer so it is not all your own the equipment becomes that of government and we are building ours to complement and there are a lot of equipment we are bringing in. we are giving data to government for government to know how many helicopters that flies in and out, government needs to know how choppers we have in the country and the foreign ones off course.

“As a Rivers person, we always see choppers from gulf of Guinea, neighboring countries fly into Nigeria and go out, we need to give record of this, aside that, you know you have improved the system, you have improved manpower because the location you are going to send people, we are doing the digital and manual collection”, Chike added.