The Minister of State for Aviation, Hadi Sirika, says there is no link between the Acting President Yemi Osinbajo’s visit to the Murtala Muhammed International Airport (MMIA) Lagos and the ongoing reorganisation in the aviation agencies.
Sirika said this in a statement signed and released to journalists by James Odaudu, Deputy Director, Press and Public Affairs, Ministry of Transportation in Abuja.
He said that the visit of the Acting President on Thursday was to assess the state of facilities at the nation’s number one airport.
It was also to identify possible areas that needed the government’s immediate attention, he said.
According to him, a section of the nation’s media decided, rather inexplicably, to establish a link between Professor Osinbajo’s visit and the recent reorganisation at the nation’s aviation agencies.
“It must be made clear that there is no basis to link both events together.
“The reorganisation in the agencies is part of an ongoing process to reposition them to properly and adequately carry out their regulatory mandates.
“It will be recalled that President Muhammadu Buhari-led administration, at inception, placed aviation among top priority areas that will be reorganised and repositioned to contribute more to the nation’s Gross Domestic Product (GDP).
“It, therefore, amounts to an error of judgment to attribute the reorganisation to the visit of Osinbajo to the Murtala Muhammed International Airport, Lagos.
“Practitioners in the media industry are, therefore, advised to always cross check their information before going to press in order to avoid unnecessary controversies and stop misinforming the public.”
The Federal Government had on Friday carried out a major shakeup in the Nigerian Civil Aviation Authority (NCAA) by terminating the appointments of nine directors.
It also announced the appointment of three directors and a general manager for the Federal Airports Authority of Nigeria (FAAN) to replace the directors it sacked in October 2016. A day after the sack of the NCAA directors, the government recalled two of them.
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