The Federal Airports Authority of Nigeria (FAAN) has said that work on the Nnamdi Azikiwe Airport (NAI), Abuja second runway would commence as soon as the agency secures clearance from the Bureau of Public Procurement (BPP).

He also disclosed that the project has been included in this year’s budget, hoping that it would get the approval of BPE

Engr. Saleh Dunoma, disclosed these to aviation correspondents in an interview at the agency’s corporate headquarters at the Murtala Muhammed Airport (MMA), Lagos.

According to him, “That has gone far. This is a big document here. The document contains the design and everything about the second runway. It’s in our 2019 budget. Actually, the consultancy is being processed. As soon as we get our clearance from the BPP, we will commence work on it. In fact, we have gone far on this.”

On revenue generation , the FAAN boss stated that a committee had been constituted to come up with strategies on how to increase the revenue profile of the agency especially the non-aeronautical sources.

Dunoma contended that it was high time airport authorities on the continent diversified their revenue generations outside aeronautic to non-aeronautic, adding that Airport Managers in other parts of the world had already embraced this.

Dunoma stated that the committee, which he chaired consisted of relevant directorates and departments responsible for revenue generation for FAAN and would come out with a roadmap to enhance revenues for the agency.

FAAN, as an agency, he continued could not be left behind in the development of its airport infrastructure, but that the only way to achieve this was for the agency to diversify its revenue generation and harness several opportunities in the system.

He also stated that apart from Nigeria, other airport authorities across the continent were also looking at how to boost their non-aeronautical revenue services, which according to him formed the theme of this year’s Airports Council International (ACI) conference held in Egypt.

According to him, “What we intend to do is to diversify our revenue sources. In Africa, we have not tapped into non-aeronautical sources and we are encouraging African airports to look at non-aeronautical revenue sources of revenue because aeronautical sources of revenues have limitations; they are highly dependent on flight operations.The non-aeronautical revenues are being developed so much that they can be in pari-passu with the aeronautical sources of revenues. This is what we want African airports to develop. Some papers were presented to guide African airports to develop that area.”

He continued, “As a matter of fact, I just finished a meeting with my team. I set up a team on revenue generation and this team is chaired by me. It is very sensitive to the survival of African airports especially FAAN. The meeting has started and we will continue to meet every week until we get to where we want to be.

“We have not come up with a target yet, but the committee will come up with that. There are lots of departments involved, including engineering and commercial. By the time we develop some projects, we will have revenue targets that we want to achieved. This will be done by the committee.”

On Aviation Security (AVSEC) carrying arm, he stated that it was going through some processes that would eventually lead to the approval of AVSEC to bear arms in 2019.

He explained further that before the end of the year, AVSEC personnel would have been approved to bear arms in order to increase their surveillance of the sector.

He, however, stated that before this could be achieved, the department required some trainings and approvals especially from the National Security Adviser (NSA), stressing that background checks would also be carried out on some of the personnel before the approval.

“There are certain projects that we need to implement before we can start carrying arms. Number one, we have to get the arms. Number two, we have to store the ammunitions somewhere. We need to embark on projects that will enable us to have storage somewhere at the airport. Number three, we need to profile and train. It is not everybody that will bear arms. This, we must apply. We cannot train ourselves. We have to be trained by those that have been long in the system; the State Security Service and the Nigeria police.”

“Also, we want to make sure that we get certification from the office of the National Security Adviser. We have to go through these processes. As soon as we are through with all these, they can then be allowed to carry arms. We intend to do this before the end of the year,” he added.

On the ongoing certification of international airports by the Nigerian Civil Aviation Authority (NCAA), Dunoma assured that other airports would be certified very soon by the regulatory agency, stressing that the exercise was at different stages of completion.

He listed the airports that would be certified to include: Kano, Port Harcourt, Enugu and Kaduna airports and that these airports were going through the certification processes.