We’re ashamed of revelations in NAMA – Union leader

Secretary-General of the National Union of Air Transport Employees, NUATE, Comrade Olayinka Abioye, has described the recent sleaze revelation in the Nigerian Airspace Management Agency, NAMA, as a shame to the Nigerian aviation industry.
Abioye also called on the Federal Government to extend its corruption search to other aviation agencies in the sector.
Speaking yesterday with our correspondent at the union’s headquarters at the Murtala Muhammed Airport, MMA, Lagos, Abioye said the unions especially NUATE, had complained about corrupt practices in the agency in the past, but the complaints, were treated with the pinch of salt by the government.
He however, commended President Muhammadu Buhari for his efforts at sanitising the nation including the economy, stressing that this would serve as a deterrent to others.
The EFCC had on February 12, 2016 arrested and detained about six top management staff of NAMA including its Managing Director, Engineer Ibrahim Abdulsalam Ibrahim, over N6.9 billion fraud in the agency.
The suspects were last Thursday arraigned before a Federal High Court in Lagos and are being prosecuted on a 21- count charge.
Abdusalam is charged alongside Nnamdi Udoh (still at large), Adegorite Olumuyiwa, Agbolade Segun, Clara Aliche, Joy Ayodele Adegorite, Randville Invesment Limited and Multeng Travels and Tours Limited.

They were arraigned before Justice Babs Kuewumi.

Abioye insisted that the unions were happy at the developments in the agency, but, decried that since the arrest of Abdulsalam, there had been a lacuna in the system despite the appointment of an Acting Managing Director for the agency by the government.
He said: “That situation brought shame to the nation’s aviation industry. The unions had complained of several infractions in the agency over the years, but all our complaints were thrown back at us for lack of evidence. Even, when we provide the government with evidences they asked us for, they still don’t act.
“We are happy at what is happening at NAMA, but there should not be a lacuna in the system. The government should bring in a substantive Managing Director for the agency. The Acting Managing Director is incompetent because he complained that his hands are tied.”
He also alleged that most of the agencies in the sector are striving to pay staff salaries due to several corrupt practices in the system, adding that succession plan had collapsed totally in the sector in the past 10 years.