Yemisi Izuora
Nigeria, 23 others commit to single air transport market
The committee set up by the Federal Government to look at reforms in the aviation industry as regards multiple taxes charged airlines have concluded its reports.
A hint into that was revealed yesterday by the Director, Air Transport Regulations, Grp. Capt. Edem Oyo-Ita (Rtd) at the sensitisation workshop on the commencement of the Single African Air Transport Market (SAATM) to stakeholders in the Nigerian aviation sector held in Lagos.
He said the Minister set up the committee to look at harmonisation of taxes that have made airline operations cumbersome and one that has been attributed to low performance of Nigerian carriers.
Nigerians airlines are faced with 34 charges levied against them by government agencies and organisations in the aviation sector that have made the nation’s aviation rank among the highest taxed sector in the world.
A document made available to our correspondent by a source in the Ministry of Transportation indicated that the charges and levies are apart from the five per cent Value Added Tax (VAT) paid into coffers of the Federal Government through the Federal Inland Revenue Service (FIRS).
The levies, according to the document, are divided into aeronautic and non-aeronautic revenues and are added to charges collected from passengers as air tickets.
Twenty-one of the charges are paid into the coffers of the Federal Airports Authority of Nigeria (FAAN), six are paid into Nigerian Civil Aviation Authority (NCAA) and the Nigerian Airspace Management Agency (NAMA).
The breakdown of aeronautic charges included aircraft inspection, which is tickets and Duty Tour Allowance (DTA) paid to the coffers of NCAA.
The DTA depends on the country the aircraft is being inspected, but a source said airlines pay at least $10,000 to the agency for each inspection of its aircraft. Also, landing charges are divided into two – day and night.
During the day, airlines pay N25 per kilogramme of the aircraft weight while they are charged N37.5 per kilogramme of the aircraft at night. FAAN collects the charge from airlines.
Speaking at the event, Minister of State for Aviation, Hadi Sirika stated that more than ever before, the future presents both greater challenges and greatest potentials as a continent striving to reposition itself by leveraging on the immense potentials that the full implementation of Yamoussoukro Decision (YD) through the Single African Air Transport Market (SAATM) offers, especially in enhancing traffic connectivity and significant growth in passengers volumes over the next few years.
Sirika who was represented by the Managing Director of Nigerian Airspace Management Agency (NAMA), Capt. Fola Akinkuotu said African nations must therefore strive to commit to the full implementation and operationalization of SAATM, and the need to leap forward so as to become an effective global competitor in aviation.
Nigeria being one of the pioneer Member States signatories to YD, one of the 23 states that have so far made solemn commitment to the implementation of SAATM by 2018 has constituted a National implementation committee to review all the subsisting Bilateral Air Services Agreements (BASAs) to be in consonance with the YD while the process of domesticating the decision is currently at the advance stage.
The Minister further stated that Nigeria recognized the need to provide for enhanced traffic growth that will be an offshoot of the full operationalization of SAATM.
His words, “Currently some of the International airports are being expanded with the addition of new terminals, the Government has also approved the concession of the major international airports in its efforts to reposition them for better service delivery”.
He applauded AFCAC for striving relentlessly to create more awareness and its participation with Member States in the continental and global aviation activities as well as its singular pursuit to ensure full implementation of YD.
Secretary General of African Civil Aviation Commission (AFCAC), Iyabo Sosina said through the advocacy activities African Union Commission, AFCAC and current members of the Ministerial Working Group, the number of countries that have signed the solemn commitment has increased from eleven to 23.
These members are Benin, Burkina Faso, Botswana, Cape Verde, Republic of Congo, Cote d’Ivoire, Egypy, Gabon, Ghana, Guinea Conakry, Kenya, Liberia, Mali, Mozambique, Niger, Nigeria, Rwanda, Sierra Leone, South Africa, Swaziland, Togo and Zimbabwe.
Sosina noted that with the proposed launch of SAATM this week and the next in Addis Ababa by the AU Heads of State and government, “We expect this number to increase substantially as more and more countries are undergoing various processes in their respective countries to commit to the immediate implementation of SAATM.