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•Bristow Helicopters in eye of storm as minister, NCAA keep mum
By Chinelo Obogo
A member of staff of Bristow Helicopters (name withheld) resumed work as usual and shortly after arriving the office, checked his e-mail box and noticed that he had received a message from the Citizenship and Business Department of the Federal Ministry of Interior, informing him that his employer has designated him as an understudy to his foreign counterpart.
At first, he thought it was sent by fraudsters because in his many years as a member of staff of the non-scheduled domestic airline, he had never received any email from the ministry. But he was not alone. After a few calls to other Nigerian colleagues, he realised that they had also received letters from the ministry with the same message.
They initially didn’t understand what was going on as at the time; they had not received any form of correspondence from the management of the airline informing them that they would be understudying their foreign colleagues. It wasn’t long that the picture of what had just taken place became clear. Apparently, Bristow had, as is mandatory, applied to the Ministry of Interior for the renewal of expatriate quota positions for their foreign pilots and maintenance engineers.
An expatriate quota is a document that allows foreigners to work and live in Nigeria freely and the Ministry of Interior is responsible for the grant of such documents to companies in line with Part V, Section 36 (1) of the Nigerian Immigration Act, 2015 and Part III, Subsection 12 (1&2) of Immigration Regulations. The grant for the establishment of expatriate quota is usually given to companies to enable them engage the services of expatriates for a period of three years in the first instance and renewable biennially within a life span of 10 years. When a company wants to renew the employment of its expatriates, it applies to the Ministry of Interior and if all conditions are met, the quota would be renewed for a period of two years until the expiration of its 10 years life span.
Allegations of exploitation
On the surface, there seemed to be nothing wrong with a domestic airline applying to the ministry to have the expatriate quota of its foreign pilots and maintenance engineers renewed. But beneath this innocuous request was something very serious. Most of the Nigerian pilots and aircraft maintenance engineers who received the letters from the ministry of interior designating them as under studies are actually senior, more qualified and experienced with more hours on type than their foreign counterparts whom they were to understudy.
“The operator is supposed to officially inform its Nigerian member of staff through a letter that he or she will be understudying his foreign counterpart but in this case, Bristow didn’t pass any information across. Their Nigerian pilots and engineers only got to find out that they were understudies when they all got letters from the Ministry of Interior informing them of this. Bristow kept them in the dark. How can I be understudying someone and I am not aware of it?
“What Bristow did is that it wrote to the Ministry of Interior and probably told them that they don’t have Nigerians who are qualified for the job. The interior ministry asked them if they have Nigerians that would understudy those that they want to bring in and they said yes.
“They submitted the names of senior Nigerian captains and engineers with about 20 years experience in the same aircraft type, whereas many of these foreigners are actually the ones learning from their Nigerian counterparts and in some cases, the foreign workers and their understudy are in different bases which makes it appear as though the company wants to game the system. The thing blew up because the Ministry of Interior was transparent enough to send letters directly to the Nigerians who were to understudy the expatriates without the airline’s knowledge. It didn’t use to happen like this in the past.
“Many very qualified Nigerian pilots and engineers are out of jobs because a good number of our domestic airlines are rendering them redundant but expatriates are doing the jobs that Nigerians more than qualified can do,” an industry source told Daily Sun.
The publicity secretary of the National Association of Aircraft Pilots and Engineers (NAAPE), Francis Igwe, who is a member of staff of the Nigeria Civil Aviation Authority (NCAA) told Daily Sun that Nigeria’s laws on expatriate quota are clear in that the Ministry of Interior and the regulatory agency are supposed to see evidence of public advertisement for the positions in a national daily. The company would also have to show clearly how they intend to phase out the foreign workers and present proof of non-availability of Nigerian talent.
He said: “When a company wants to employ expatriates, the law states that you have to advertise the vacancies in a national daily. If after the advertisement is placed and no qualified Nigerian applies for that position, then expatriates can be employed. When the expatriate is employed, there would have to be Nigerians in that company understudying them to acquire knowledge that would enable the person get the qualification and this would last for a specific period of time.
“Where the NCAA comes in is in the area of licensing. When expatriates come into the industry, especially pilots and engineers, the license they acquired in their own country has to be validated in Nigeria and the duration of that validation would be based on the contract terms of their work permit. What NCAA does is that if you validate your license, it would be tagged with the license you have from your country.
“In the past, these airlines found a way to maneuver the system but about two years ago, under the administration of Capt. Musa Nuhu, the NCAA rejected lots of applications from airlines trying to get renewed license for their expatriates who have overstayed in Nigeria. When the agency investigates and finds out that the airline is trying to subvert the expatriate quota, they reject such applications. I am personally aware of some of such applications that NCAA turned down.”
National Civil Aviation Policy, May 2023
Section 4.1 of the National Civil Aviation Policy, May 2023, states: “Validation of foreign crew licenses shall be done by the NCAA based on specific needs and requirements. While validation of Nigerian who hold foreign licenses shall be automatic, subject to taking and passing the required examinations, foreigners who seek validation of their licenses shall be subject to foreign quota requirements of both the NCAA and the Federal Ministry of Interior.
(i)The validation of foreign crew/technical personnel licenses will be considered for increasing qualified Nigerian flight crew, technical personnel and aviation instructors for flying schools and clubs. The government’s objective is to promote the employment of qualified and competent Nigerian aviation professionals. In pursuance of the above objective, the following would be accomplished; (a) NCAA shall provide from time-to-time, regulations on the use of foreign crew/technical personnel and put in place, mechanisms to ensure that it can assess and determine that the foreign crew and technical personnel are required.
(b)NCAA shall ensure that the foreign crew/technical personnel are used only when there is no availability of qualified Nigeria crew/technical personnel. (c) NCAA must have a database of all qualified Nigerian crew/technical personnel and their work status, (d) NCAA shall ensure that foreign crew/technical personnel meet the requirements for validation and conversion of foreign licenses in line with NCAA and ICAO standards, (e) The Department of Licensing in the NCAA shall provide from time to time, the process of validation of foreign crew/technical personnel licenses.
(f) Operators seeking validation of foreign flight crew/technical personnel shall provide to the NCAA, full justification for the request, including detailed practical programmes for training Nigerian flight crew/technical personnel and phasing out the foreign crew/technical personnel. This programme would be carefully reviewed for compliance every 90 days by the Director General of the NCAA.
Nigerian pilots and engineers protest
NAAPE had in a strongly worded letter seen by Daily Sun and addressed to the Minister of Interior, the Director General of the NCAA, the Minister of Aviation and Aerospace Development and the Controller of Immigration, described Bristow’s actions as a flagrant disregard to expatriates quota laws, knowing that their foreign workers have been in the country more than 10 years and have been receiving trainings that ordinarily should go to Nigerians considering the fact that the company has been in Nigeria since 1965 and have had enough to train Nigerian pilots and engineers.
“This fraudulent abuse of expatriate quota provision by Bristow Helicopters is of great concern to us because jobs meant for Nigerians are given to foreigners even with the worrisome rate of unemployment. Apart from that, the company has continued to use that to discriminate against Nigerian pilots and engineers in terms of pay rates and emoluments while they pay and treat the foreigners higher and better for equal job done.
“The designation of our experienced members as understudy of less qualified foreign counterparts is an affront on our members and a deliberate subjugation which is unacceptable. The serial violation of expatriate quota by Bristow should not be allowed because of the capital flight associated with the scheme when government is trying to save money,” the letter read in part.
Director at Ministry of Interior walks out Daily Sun’s reporter from office
In the course of investigating the allegations against Bristow, Daily Sun’s reporter, Mr. Isaac Anumihe, went to the Abuja office of the Ministry of Interior on Thursday, January 18, 2024, to enquire if Bristow Helicopters met all the requirements to qualify for expatriate quota it applied for.
At the ministry, the reporter was asked by the Deputy Director of Press, Mr. Fatai Afonja, to meet the Director, Citizens and Business whose responsibility is to issue business permit and expatriate quota. On getting to his office, the Director ordered the reporter not to record or write anything otherwise he would walk the reporter out of his office.
When the condition was accepted, he summoned Mr. Afonja and tongue-lashed him for directing a reporter to his office. Then, he told the reporter that he should have followed the laid-down rule of writing to the minister first before barging into his office. At that point, the reporter was forced to contact the management. While the reporter was still communicating with the management, the Director asked two of his aides to walk the reporter out of his office.
Bristow, Ministry of Interior, NCAA, keep mum despite Freedom of Information request
Daily Sun also sent text messages to Bristow Helicopters and NCAA on the same issue but got no response from them. When that failed, the decision to officially write a Freedom of Information (FOI) request to the management of Bristow, the Director General of the NCAA, Capt. Chris Najomo and the Minister of Interior, Olubunmi Tunji-Ojo was reached.
Knowing how difficult it is to get information from government agencies despite the FOI Act that was passed into law in 2011, Daily Sun decided to send requests to the three organisations and give them sufficient time to respond.
Daily Sun sent an FOI request to the NCAA headquarters and it was duly received and stamped by an agency official on Wednesday, January 24, 2024. Among other requests, Daily Sun asked the agency to send the list of requirements needed to qualify for validation of foreign license for engineers and pilots, a list of applications for validation of foreign license in the past four years, including that made by Bristow Helicopters and other operators and copies of approval given to applicants within the time frame.
Another FOI request was sent to the Ministry of Interior and it was duly received and stamped by an official on Thursday, January 25, 2024. Similar requests made to the NCAA was made to the Ministry for expatriate quota. On the same day, Bristow Helicopters acknowledged receipt of an FOI request sent by Daily Sun as well. In the letters sent to all three bodies, they were reminded that by the provision of the FOI Act, 2011, they had seven days to respond. However, weeks later, neither the ministry nor the NCAA responded to the application. Bristow Helicopters also kept mum.
