In life, there are many lessons to learn One of such is to fight before attaining success. Most often the fight or rather the war, sometimes could be bloody with resultant bloody nose.
Naturally, when a seed is planted, it goes through what agriculturists first often describe as osmosis and when it bloosoms out of the soil after undergoing lots of transformation and fighting its way out of the soil, the seed turns out more beautiful. So, is a man who went into a Bulls fight. He is aware that such a fight could give him a parmanet disability but when he is done, he turns out to be a hero.
So, when President Bola Tinubu talks about renewed hope, he may not have envisaged that there would be what the Yorubas describe as “rofo-rofo fight” which aptly describes the Bulls fight. A Bull is not a mere animal. Here is a fearless and courageous animal that can tackle any other bigger animal like the elephant. The man in the eye of the storm that is rattling and surprising everyone is a man call Festus Keyamo who is the minister for Aviation and Aerospace Development. Keyamo. said some private aircraft operating in Nigeria are being used for money laundering, drug trafficking and other illegal activities. A fearless Keyamo made the revelation at the Ministry of Aviation in Abuja, when he inaugurated a Ministerial Taskforce Committee to checkmate illegal chartered operations in the country. Though the minister did not mention the names of the airlines, he asserted that these illegal activities have made the sector lose billions of dollars and raised serious security. The minister further stated that some of those involved in the illegal activities are those who acquired licenses for non-commercial flights operations but gone against the stipulated agreement of the licenses. Addressing the committee members, Keyamo mandated that they take inventory of all non-commercial flights operators, investigate all professional licenses and checkmate their authencity as well as recommend disciplinary measures against airlines found culpable.
The eight-man committee was chaired by the Chief Executive Officer of Aero Contractors, Ado Sanusi, and the committee is expected to report all findings to the minister within the next three months. Impressively, just as the Bull can take on larger animals like the elephant and even the Lion, the minister was heard daring these “Sinners in the Air”, and directing their attention to his record as prosecutor of the Economic and financial crime commission (Efcc) by diligently checking the record of those he prosecuted for over a decade. Keyamo was beating his chest because he knows the President is behind every of his actions to clean up the aviation ministry.
Last week, this column supported the efforts of the Iron Lady at the helms of affair at the
National Agency for Food Drug Administration and Control (NAFDAC)
headed by another indefatigable Prof. Mojisola Adeyeye who carried out a sting operation on illegal drug sellers , the same way General Buba Marwa of the National drug enforcement agency ( NDLEA) persistently invade and arrest drug barons, so other security agencies operating around the airports should collaborate with the officials of the Aviation minster to expose these illegalities. The “fight” is not that of Keyamo nor the Aviation ministry alone. The fight is a national fight and these evil perpetrators must not be allowed to continue to survive. Their operational tactics must be dismantled and frustrated so that the country can survive. Apart from denying the country of revenue, they are gradually sniffing life out of the country when these drugs find their ways into the country. These drugs then find their ways into the hands of criminals like bandits, terrorists , kidnappers and other illegal users . These illegal users automatically transport them closer to our neighborhoods and communities. Countries whose airspace are used for for illegal importation of drugs are also susceptible to illegal importation of arms and ammunitions. Keyano who is a senior advocate is not relenting in his sworn believe that corruption is an anathema to a country and must not be allowed to survive in the country. The Bull is described as a solidly built and aggressively built and very fearless animal. No wonder Keyamo had always taken up the corrupt elites ind had fearlessly and courageously exposed them in the overall interest of the country. For example, the patriotic exposure of some documents of agreements on botched Nigeria Air signed by Hadi Sirika, the former minister of aviation exposed some pages of the documents, explaining some parts of the deed of agreements signed by Sirika and the Ethiopian government.
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. 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.”
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 and all the profits would go to Addis Ababa. “The CEO of Nigeria Air would have been an Ethiopian, financial officer Ethiopian, 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. These are why we need many Keyamos in the system.security flle