Globe 24/7: Senate advises NAMA to suspend $3,000 charges on private airline operators

THE Nigerian Airspace Management Agency (NAMA), has been told to suspend the recent charges it imposed on local and foreign registered private airline operators, on non-scheduled flights in the country.

Chairman, Senate Committee on Aviation, Senator Hope Uzodinma,  said this, on Monday, during a meeting held with NAMA management and private aircraft operators on non-scheduled flights.

The purpose of the meeting, Uzodinma said, was for consultion with the airline operators, with a view of adopting a levy that would be mutually acceptable to all parties.

He said consultations were necessary and advocated for a stakeholders’ retreat to iron out the cause of the current dispute between the operators and the regulatory agencies in the aviation sector.

He also advised both parties to choose a date for the meeting, but asked that the new charges be suspended until after proper consultations.

NAMA recently introduced a new pay-as-you-go charge regime whereby foreign registered airline operators were expected to pay a flat levy of $3, 000 while their indigenous counterparts were levied $2, 500 on each flight embarked upon by their aircraft.

Before the commencement of the new levy regime, operators were charged based on their routes, navigational terminal and weight of their aircraft.

Such various charges were paid to different aviation agencies operating at the nation’s airports.

Speaking at the meeting,  spokesman of the private airlines operators, Alhaji Bala Ibn Na’allah, described the new levies as discriminatory, as the arrangement was not applicable to airline operators on scheduled flights.

While agreeing that the Civil Aviation Act 2006 section 30 (2) empowered the Nigerian Civil Aviation Authority (NCAA) to impose levies, he said such levies should not be imposed without adequate consultations with relevant stakeholders.

“We want to be led by the rule of law. NCAA did not consult us before imposing levies on us.

“We are urging the senators to impress upon the NCAA to always carry us along through consultations because Section 70 (1) C of the Act did not allow them to do whatever will be detrimental to the nation.

 “For every take off, we are paying $2, 500. Why are we paying in dollars when it is not our local currency in the country and NAMA did not see anything bad in implementing such discriminatory policy?

“It is discriminatory for NCAA to charge different levies for scheduled and non scheduled aircrafts. The law recommends payments either in local or hard currency but NAMA do not collect naira”, he said.

Director General,  NAMA, Mazi Nnamdi Udoh, noted that airlines operators were very crucial to the nation, but said NAMA did not force the operators to pay in dollars.

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