APC stalwart lauds Tinubu’s interventions in aviation sector
By Kelvin Osa Okunbor A stalwart of the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC), Dr. Thomas Ogungbagbe, has hailed President Bola Ahmed Tinubu for ensuring massive infrastructure upgrade at the Murtala
By Kelvin Osa Okunbor
A stalwart of the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC), Dr. Thomas Ogungbagbe, has hailed President Bola Ahmed Tinubu for ensuring massive infrastructure upgrade at the Murtala Muhammed International Airport (MMIA), Lagos, and other airport terminals into regional hubs.
Ogungbagbe, a senatorial aspirant for Osun East, said the Tinubu administration is implementing intentional policies and projects to improve and elevate the aviation sector’s infrastructure.
Speaking at the quarterly business breakfast meeting of the industry’s think-tank group, Aviation Safety RoundTable Initiative (ASRTI), the APC stalwart noted that, based on the projects the administration has embarked on through the industry’s agencies, the status the aviation sector is seeking would be achieved.
The CITA Energies Chairman noted that the infrastructural revolution going on at the Lagos Airport showed that the Federal Government was galvanising links for improved superstructure.
Applauding the Tinubu Aviation Development Agenda, Ogungbagbe said the government is not resting on its oars in pushing for strategies to increase passenger traffic into the country’s airports in order to grow the gross domestic product (GDP).
Drawing parallels between a country’s GDP, its population and passenger traffic, the senatorial aspirant alluded to the experience in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) and Singapore.
He said: “There is a direct link between the number of passenger traffic and the growth of the GDP. This explains why President Bola Ahmed Tibunu’s administration is trying all it could to make Nigeria a strategic airport hub.
Read Also: Nigeria, Saint Kitts & Nevis to exchange special envoys
“Given this determination by the Tinubu administration, all aviation industry stakeholders and operators need to support the administration to transform Nigeria into an effective hub.”
Describing the current annual passenger statistics of less than 20 million as abysmal, Ogungbagbe said a projection of over 300 million passengers travelling through Nigerian airports could be seen as a growth opportunity.
He said this is the reason the administration gas been mobilising efforts to attract investment into aviation, like other countries, including the United States, have done to boost its passenger traffic.
Commenting on the contributions of CITA Energies in the air transport value chain, Ogungbagbe described the company as the largest aviation fuel company in the country.
He said ths company has sufficient footprints in many airports.
He said: “We have a good geographical spread, as they say, we are everywhere you go. With investments committed to aviation development to make airports functional. In our over 20-year trajectory, we have emerged the largest fuel marketer in Africa and second in the world.”
