Stakeholder Calls For Rebuilding Of MMIA

An international business executive and a regular air passenger at the Port Harcourt International Airport, Omagwa, Chief Marckson Ndukwe, has called on the Federal Government to rebuild the Murtala Mohammed International Airport, Lagos, saying the airpot’s capacity is being over stretched.
He said that the Lagos airport which was built in 1979 had never had any expansion work done on it, in spite of the increase in the number of foreign and indigenous carriers using the airport.
Ndukwe who made this known while speaking to aviation correspondents in an interview at the Port Harcourt International Airport, Wednesday, noted that the federal authorities had not done enough to meet up with the increasing population in air transportation in the country.
According to him, the construction giant in Nigeria; Julius Berger Nigeria Limited had carried out a comprehensive study on the reconstruction of the airport on the quest for rebuilding the airport.
“Since 1979 when the Murtala Mohammed Airport was built, no expansion work has taken place despite increase of foreign and indigenous carriers using the airport.
“ The airport which was inaugurated in 1979 for 300,000 passenger capacity now processes about eight million passengers. Such mismatch does not portray Nigeria as a country planning for the growth of its aviation industry.
“ The airport generates most of the income in the sector, and so it is only right it is given a facelift that it requires as the most busy airport in the country which should be developed as a regional hub within Africa”, he said.
The business executive, however, urged the federal authorities and the airport managers to also consider other airports in the country like the Port Harcourt International airport among others, for competitive airline operations.
He said that the Lagos airport was almost congested with influx of airlines, whereas some other airports like the Port Harcourt airport has just few airlines that operate there.

Corlins Walter