Aviation experts have called for the speedy passage of the bill, “Fly Nigeria Act” to enhance the capacity of indigenous airline operators.

Speaking at a stakeholders’ forum, a former chairman of House of Representatives Committee on Aviation, Mr Bethel Amadi, the Head of Marketing, Arik Air, Mr Lanre Bamgbose and Olu Ohunayo said the passage of the bill and its full implementation would assist indigenous carriers to have better passenger traffic.

Amadi who chaired the stakeholders forum on the bill, stressed the need for federal government to put in place protectionist policies that would enable domestic airlines to stave off the competitions of mega carriers from Europe, Asia and Amercia whose interest was to rake  in money from the aviation industry.

He said with the right policies in place  government would ensure sufficient patronage of the Nigerian carriers which in turn would raise their service levels instead of creating wealth for foreign carriers.

According to him, one of the ways to achieve this is to create a caveat that will make provision for signing of interline and code share agreements on routes that indigenous carriers do not fly, to increase revenues for the airlines.

Also speaking, Mrs Bisi Akodu of Olisa Agbakoba Chambers, sponsors of the bill said the “Fly Nigeria Act” would ensure that Arik Air, Air Nigeria and others would have the opportunity to improve on their operational capacity by having more revenues from flying government officials, thereby creating a firm pedestal to compete with their foreign counterparts.

“Without such legislative framework which is achievable with the bill, it will be difficult to support Nigerian carriers, which have been short-changed with lopsided bilateral air services agreements that the Federal Government signed with many countries,” she added.

She said that the bill would assist to grow the economy, reduce capital flight as well as create a solid platform for indigenous carriers to grow.