Femi Fani-Keyode, Nigeria’s Ambassador-designate to South Africa, has come to the defense of former President Olusegun Obasanjo regarding the downfall of Nigeria Airways, maintaining that the carrier’s deep-rooted challenges existed prior to his return to power in 1999.
Fani-Kayode, who served as Minister of Aviation under Obasanjo, made the clarification on Thursday while responding to comments by the current Minister of Aviation and Aerospace Development, Festus Keyamo, on the liquidation of the defunct national carrier.
Keyamo had accused Obasanjo’s administration of liquidating Nigeria Airways in September 2004 without paying the pensions and gratuities owed to its workers.
The minister made the allegation while criticising former Vice-President Atiku Abubakar, the presidential candidate of the African Democratic Congress (ADC), over his claim that President Bola Tinubu’s policies had made life more expensive for pensioners and Nigerians generally.
In a post on X, Keyamo wrote: “Your Excellency, Atiku Abubakar @atiku, this is hypocrisy at its peak! Let me just talk only about the sector that I head, Aviation.
“In September, 2004, when you were Vice-President, your Government woke up one morning and liquidated Nigeria Airways, throwing thousands of Nigerian out of jobs and into sorrow and pain. To add salt into their wounds, you refused to pay them their pensions and gratuities, running into billions of Naira.
“Twenty-two years later, after many of them have died out of frustration, President Bola Ahmed Tinubu @officialABAT is now clearing the mess you left behind. Over a month ago, Mr. President approved and released the total sum N36 billion to bring succour to these families. They have started receiving alerts and praying for Mr. President. In fact, the President was given an Award for this by the workers’ union a few weeks ago.”
However, Fani-Kayode argued that Obasanjo inherited an already deteriorated airline when he returned to office in 1999, attributing its decline to years of alleged corruption and mismanagement.
In his response posted on X, the former aviation minister addressed Keyamo directly, saying, “My dearest brother @fkeyamo,
“Permit me to share the facts with you on this matter for posterity’s sake. In fairness to President Obasanjo the Nigeria Airways “mess” as you have described it, was established before he came back to power in 1999.
“And it was indeed a mess but it was not of Obasanjo’s making. He met it there after he was sworn in and what he found broke his heart.
“I, as Minister of Aviation from 2006 after being redeployed from being Minister of Culture and Tourism, can confirm that.”
Fani-Kayode contrasted the state of the airline when Obasanjo left office as military head of state in 1979 with its condition when he returned to power two decades later.
He said Nigeria Airways had 32 functional aircraft in 1979, alongside experienced pilots and crew members, a competent management team and an accountable board of directors.
“Nigeria Airways, at that time, was indeed the pride of the nation. By the time Obasanjo came back to power in 1999, 20 years later, there was only one plane left and it was not functional.
“The rest had vanished together with virtually all of the company’s assets. Everything in the company had gone to the dogs. Worse still it was plagued with debts,” he said.
The ambassador-designate further blamed successive management teams and boards for the airline’s deterioration during the intervening years.
“Through those 20 years all forms of corruption were committed by the various management teams and Board of Directors of the company and it was literally gutted,” Fani-Kayode said.
His response comes amid a public exchange over responsibility for Nigeria Airways’ collapse and the outstanding entitlements of its former workers, following Keyamo’s claim that the Tinubu administration had approved N36 billion to settle the liabilities.
What You Should Know
This political exchange highlights an ongoing debate among Nigerian leaders regarding accountability for past public asset failures and the handling of worker benefits.
- Positive Impact: Current interventions, such as President Tinubu’s approval of funds to settle liabilities, bring financial relief to long-suffering former aviation workers and their families.
- Potential Concerns: Continued finger-pointing between past and present administrations distracts from transparent accountability and timely resolution of long-standing labor issues in the aviation sector.
