Fidelia Okafor

The minister of state, budget and planning, Mrs. Zainab Ahmed has commended the Federal Airports Authority of Nigeria (FAAN) for upgrading facilities in the arrival hall of the international wing of the Murtala Mohammed Airport, (MMIA), Lagos.

The minister made the commendation in Lagos during a one-day facility tour of the terminal explained that the essence of the visit was to see how well government’s resources are utilized.

“There has been an upgrade that shows an improvement in passengers’ experience, especially in the arrival hall.”

“We are also here to see and understand the challenges that the airport is facing so that when resources are to be allocated or disbursed, we will do it with the understanding of how they are to be used,” she added.

Ahmed who accompanied by some officials from her ministry also said her team would write a report and indicate what “they have observed and also share the report with the authority for them to see what has been recorded from the visit.”

She also said some of the reports on the projects given to the ministry were in tandem with “what is on the ground.”

She added that that a lot of progress had been made though “a lot more still needs to be done.”

Commenting on the projects going on at the airport, she said: “We have seen a number of projects at different levels of completion. We have seen a lot of good work that has been done. There are some projects that are suffering as a result of number of different challenges. We have also seen the upgrade of the airport that shows an improvement in users’ experience, especially at the arrival hall of the airport.”

Nevertheless, she said: “We need to do a lot of work to upgrade the departure area of the airport. The luggage handling process is very problematic. It is largely manual and as a result of customers spend hours before getting their luggage. That needs to be addressed,”

Ahmed was accompanied on the tour by officials of her ministry as well as some officials from aviation agencies including the director general of the Nigerian Civil Aviation Authority (NCAA), Capt. Muhtar Usman, FAAN’s director of finance and accounts, Mrs. Nike Aboderin;  director, commercial and business development, Mr. Sadiku Rafindadi; acting director, maintenance and engineering, Mr. Salisu Daura; chief of staff to FAAN’s managing director, Mr. Zakari Mahmuda; general manager, budget and planning, Mr. Abiodun Adegbesan; acting airport manager, Murtala Muhammed International Airport, Ms. Victoria Shin-Aba and FAAN’s acting general manager, corporate affairs, Mrs. Henrietta Yakubu.