Following the announcement by the Federal Airports Authority of Nigeria, FAAN, on plans to relocate its corporate headquarters from Abuja to Lagos, Aviation workers have said they’re in full support.
In a joint statement on Friday, the workers under the aegis, Air Transport Services Senior Staff Association, National Union of Air Transport Employees and the Association of Nigerians Aviation Professionals backed the announcement.
ZSummit Post reports that FAAN, in a statement by Obiageli Orah, Director, Public Affairs and Consumer Protection on Thursday, said the Minister of Aviation and Aerospace Development, Festus Keyamo, gave the order for the relocation to end financial wastage.
Reacting to the development, aviation workers commended the efforts of the government.
“The recent instructions for redeployment of staff relocated to Abuja is a welcome development. It could be recalled that the unions have, on several occasions, expressed our concerns over the hasty manner in which staff were relocated to Abuja when no adequate arrangement was made in the areas of office accommodation, infrastructure and other logistics for smooth relocation, senior management staff were left stranded without an office and working tools. In contrast, it stated that junior staff were helpless, with no provision for documents and working files and, most worrisome, the absence of data backup.“
The unions added, “We are also of the opinion that staff who have collected relocation allowance even though not sufficient should not be paid for this redeployment.”
It would be recalled that the Former Minister of Aviation, Hadi Sirika, after the COVID-19 lockdown in 2020, ordered that the headquarters of FAAN and other aviation agencies in Lagos be relocated to Abuja.