Welcoming the new NCAA DG

Tribune Online
Welcoming the new NCAA DG

LAST week, news went round about the replacement of the erstwhile director-general of the Nigerian Civil Aviation Authority (NCAA), Captain Usman Murthar, with Captain Musa Nuhu.

The interesting thing about the appointment is that the two men have a similar professional background of being aircraft pilots.

The replacement of Captain Murthar to many people in the sector was long overdue owing to what many called the lackadaisical attitude he displayed towards many critical safety issues in the sector that required prompt action or reaction.

While many have argued that the immediate past DG did his best, majority have traced most of the controversies that had confronted the sector to the inability of the former DG to assert his position vis-a-vis enforcing the civil aviation rules where necessary in line with the position of the authority as the regulatory body.

One good luck the sector enjoyed while the outgone DG held sway was that despite the obvious lapses that reared its head, the sector enjoyed zero accident in his last one year in office.

Just as he was indicted in some critical safety areas, the former DG was not in the good record of many workers in the authority. Their morale was very low due to the total neglect of their welfare and professional upgrade, such that the professional trainings they were meant to be exposed to both local and foreign almost disappeared during his tenure.

For so many reasons, key players, including many staff of the NCAA, had wanted the man out of the way for a long time, but the former DG, like a cat with nine lives, continued to have his way until last week.

That many stakeholders were fed up with his style of administration became more obvious when the news of his replacement was announced last week with many of the workers and key players heaving a sigh of relief.

Now that a ‘new sheriff is in town’, key players have expressed their optimism in the new DG, Captain Musa Nuhu who before his latest appointment had been Nigeria’s permanent representative on the International Civil Aviation Organisation (ICAO) in Montreal, Canada.

Besides being Nigeria’s representative in ICAO, as a trained pilot with experience as a quality assurance lead auditor, as well as an artificial intelligent expert, much is expected of the new DG particularly in the areas of ensuring that the organisation gets more active in its oversight safety functions.

Therefore, with such experience garnered by the new NCAA helmsman, it is expected that he will hit the ground running as a way of lifting up a regulatory civil aviation agency that is already down and its demoralised workers.

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As the entire sector awaits the assumption of duty of Captain Nuhu, it is also expected that the National Assembly will waste no time in confirming his appointment to enable him commence his job.

Again, the need to appeal to the lawmakers to clear him to do his job is coming from the unpleasant past experiences when the previous National Assemblies particularly the last one politicised the confirmation of the last two DGs.

At a point, it took the lawmakers six months to confirm the appointment of a newly appointed director general for the regulatory body without considering the negative consequence not only on safety oversights then but on the overall wrong impressions such action created about the country’s aviation sector.

Above all, it is hoped that the incoming DG will realise the fact that he has a lot of work to do to restore the lost confidence of the public, particularly the air travelers. In achieving this, the new DG needs to come up with friendly policies that will encourage the workers such as trainings and promotions which will no doubt lift an already battered morale.

It is when the workers are not denied their stipulated privileges that they will give their best for a better and safer sector.

Nigerian Tribune

Welcoming the new NCAA DG
Tribune Online