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Sixty-seven years after taking to the skies, Aero Contractors remains a significant player in Nigeria’s aviation industry, navigating an increasingly challenging operating environment.
As the airline celebrates this milestone, its Managing Director, Capt. Ado Sanusi, speaks with aviation reporters on the company’s remarkable journey, the lessons from its decades of operations, the mounting pressures on indigenous airlines and the urgent policy interventions needed to make local carriers stronger, more competitive and sustainable.
Do you think that the intervention of this administration in the aviation industry has not impacted the airlines? I want you to highlight and perhaps give us a focus on what we really need to do more to grow the aviation sector.
I believe this administration has done well in the area of infrastructure and has done well in some policies. But we are asking and telling the administration that policies and infrastructure must address the specific challenges of the industry. So, we have very specific challenges in the industry.
We do understand and appreciate the government’s efforts. I have been in this industry for the past three decades or more, so I do understand the peculiar challenges affecting the industry.
So, if policies are not geared towards addressing those challenges, particularly when the Minister of Aviation and Aerospace Development acknowledged in his speech that over 100 airlines have died since the history of aviation in Nigeria, we should address that. Why are they dying? It is not normal.
We should not accept the fact that there are 115 airlines dying in Nigeria and say it is normal. I think there is a particular problem that needs to be addressed. And it is that problem, I believe, that the industry should focus on. It is that problem that genuine reform in the sector will address.
What do I mean by industry focus? A careful study of the problems that we are facing will help to address them. Let me give you an example. Infrastructure is a very simple thing to take care of. Very simple. Because if you have the money, you know what you want to build. You go ahead and build it. Take, for example, the coastal highway being built by the Tinubu administration. Yes, you do the study. You have the money; you build it.
But the aviation industry presents more complex challenges. This is an industry where, for the past 100 years, we cannot remember when airlines had robust net profits. And this is an industry that is the pride of the nation. Nigeria Airways was shut down, liquidated and everything.
This is an industry where the fastest-growing airline in Nigeria and in West and Central Africa, in fact, arguably, in Africa, was allowed to go down. These are specific challenges that the industry faces. And I believe it is not a problem that should be shifted to the private sector to solve.
After all, when we had the banking crisis, the Federal Government stepped in. We don’t need to have an aviation crisis before the Federal Government steps in. Yes, fine, we are doing a lot. The Federal Government is doing a lot in airport infrastructure.
The federal government is doing a lot in policies. But there are specific challenges affecting both the airlines, the parastatals and the support services. There are specific problems affecting them that need to be addressed.
I want you to tell us, at 67, what are we going to see or look at, or what should we expect from Aero Contractors as the oldest airline in Nigeria?
Of course, we have more routes coming up. We intend to renew our fleet. We also intend to increase our capability list for the MRO (Maintenance, Repair and Overhaul). Meaning we are buying equipment, we are buying tooling, and very soon, we will be an Embraer centre where we will repair Embraer aircraft. We are also looking at enhancing our training capability.
We are opening a new training facility very soon, and we intend to grow it. All that is in the future for us is to be adaptive to the yearnings of our customers, to be innovative and to ensure that we give our customers, either in the MRO or in the airline, seamless, efficient and reliable service. Most importantly for us is to remain safe, and that is what we are doing.
In the area of aircraft maintenance, I want to know the countries outside Nigeria that have patronised you, what you have been doing for Nigerian airlines, and what you intend to do.
In no particular order, we have performed maintenance for a Spanish airline. We performed maintenance for an airline in Tajikistan and for an airline in that country near Russia, Mongolia.
Then, if you come down to Africa, we are currently performing heavy maintenance for Royal Air Maroc. Then, to the West of Africa, from Senegal to Mali to Ghana, and then Central Africa, we have performed maintenance for the Democratic Republic of Congo and Congo-Brazzaville. So, we are planning to expand more.
It does not happen overnight, but in nine years, what we have achieved, if you go to MROs that are 70 years old, when they were nine, they didn’t achieve what we have achieved. That gives us hope that in the coming years, we will do much more. Currently, we are planning to train engineers on the Boeing 787, and we want to be an Embraer service centre.
If you observe, you will notice that the B737 Classics are going out of fashion, and then Embraer aircraft are coming in. We are in the best place to be the service provider for those aircraft types.
So many airlines are considering cutting down flight services to routes that are not profitable. I don’t know, are you going to follow the trend, or is there anything you want to do differently?
Yes, globally, airlines are reducing flights or cutting off routes that are not profitable. Aero Contractors is probably going to do the reverse.
Because what we look at is that whenever there is this type of crisis, we see opportunities. This management will look and see opportunities building up. As airlines are withdrawing from a particular sector, we are also looking and choosing the right equipment, at the right time and at the right price, to make sure that we stay in business.
So, yes, globally, that is the trend. But these are major airlines looking at routes that are not profitable because of the high cost of Jet A1 (aviation fuel). They are deciding to cut routes and save costs. But we, at Aero Contractors, are taking a holistic approach to it.
We are looking at the crisis as an opportunity for us to grow. Because, as the saying goes, you cannot shrink yourself to greatness, if you understand what I mean.
You can’t be cutting routes and think you will grow. So, it’s only the big, big, big airlines that would like to cut routes and stay big.
What are your investments in your MRO to enable you to conduct the level of maintenance you are undertaking?
Well, we have invested, I would say, millions in equipment and tooling. Most importantly, we understand the need to have modern tools, and the tools that we have are modern tools.
Yes, there is a lot of money spent to buy them, but, as I said, we are adaptive to the new challenges that are coming our way in the MRO.
We have the toolboxes. We have invested in these toolboxes. You have to use a keycard to swipe for one to open, and then, when you take a tool, if you don’t return it, it will flag you as the person who took that tool.
This shows you the way we are operating safely, and then the investment in tools is protected. We have acquired a sweeper to prevent FOD (Foreign Object Debris). FOD can damage engines.
So, the sweeper will sweep up all pebbles, rubble and objects that are on the apron. We cannot control bird strikes, but at least we can control FOD. We have other major equipment, like the scrubber.
So much money was invested in the hangars, and we need the scrubber to keep them as clean as you have seen them right here.
We are looking at providing services to operators. By the way, the airline is my customer. I am their maintenance service provider. We have acquired so much equipment and tools to match the kind of maintenance service we offer to our clients.
