Festus Keyamo, the Minister of Aviation and Aerospace Development, has explained that documents of agreements on the failed Nigeria Air project were signed by Hadi Sirika, the former minister of aviation.

 

In a viral video, Festus Keyamo exposed some pages of the documents, explaining parts of the deed of agreements signed by Sirika and the Ethiopian government.

 

According to Keyamo, the agreement document showed that a foreign airline would have taken over Nigeria Air.

 

He stressed that the Nigerian government had no regrets about ending the agreement with Ethiopian Airlines over Nigeria Air.

 

Keyamo said, “You will be shocked if you look at this agreement. What it simply says is that a foreign government should come and take over our national carrier. Ethiopian Air was the single major shareholder in that deal. It is the same thing they did in Togo with Asky. We cannot be Togo. We are big and ambitious.

 

“We cannot give up our aviation ecosystem to another entity. What would have happened is that the Ethiopian government would now be the complete beneficiary of all our Bilateral Air Service Agreements (BASA) routes.

 

“A national carrier has first priority over all the BASA routes we have negotiated all over the world. If we give them all the routes we have suffered to negotiate, where will all those profits go? It is not Nigeria.”

 

This comes as Keyamo explained that Nigeria did not lose any foreign direct investment by not agreeing to the terms of Nigeria Air.

 

He said what the Ethiopian government was going to do was to get wet-lease aircraft and fly them as national carriers, with all the profits going to Addis Ababa.

 

“The CEO of Nigeria Air would have been an Ethiopian, the financial officer Ethiopian, the director of operations Ethiopian, and all other key positions would have been reserved for foreigners. That is not a national carrier.

 

“In the document, it also says the people that will run Nigeria Air will not pay any tax to the Nigerian government. They are not also building any investments in the country. The documents also say Nigeria will be the guarantor of any loss they suffer here,” Keyamo further explained.

 

Recall that in May last year, Keyamo announced the indefinite suspension of the Nigeria Air project.

 

While there are reports that N85 billion was spent on the Nigeria Air project, the former minister, Sirika, clarified that it was N3 billion.