Director General, NCAA, Capt. Musa Nuhu
The Director General, Nigeria Civil Aviation Authority, NCAA, Captain Musa Nuhu says, the regulatory body is committed to educating Nigerian youths to choose career in aviation to address the dearth of manpower in the sector.
Speaking at the 5th Explore Aviation Career Conference in Lagos with the theme: ‘Harnessing the potentials of the Next Generation of Aviation Professionals’, Captain Nuhu said, the industry was in dare need of adequate, competent and experienced workforce.
He said, since the restart of flight operations after the covid-19 lockdown, more airlines have commenced operations, increased their fleet and expanded their routes.
According to him, with this development and growth of the aviation industry, the scope of oversight activities of the NCAA have expanded.
Captain Nuhu stressed that, the regulatory body and the industry in general were suffering from lack of adequate specialized aviation professionals especially in the technical areas.
“Especially in the integral critical areas, it is important to know this is not peculiar to Nigeria but a global one especially with our inspectors in flight operations department”.
He said, the career conference came at the right time as this would serve as a starting point in the process of identifying and training of young aviation professionals that would ultimately operate and manage the various sectors of the industry.
“We need to have the young people to get into the aviation industry, the industry is growing, we need you, excellent career to have a wonderful career, fulfilled career at the end of the day, we would all support you”.
Convener of the conference, Joy Ogbebo said, the essence of the yearly conference was to bring the professionals and the aspiring youths together, discuss and ask questions, adding that, the impact on the industry had been tremendous.
“We all have a role to play, I have a role to play and this is one of the ways am doing that by creating a platform whereby we can connect the aspiring young ones with the relevant training organizations, opportunity to interact and network. So far this platform has been impactful within a space of five years, some of the participants are in the industry working in some training Organizations”.
Two female pilots, Captain Bolaji Agbelusi and Atinuke Stanley-Pepple say, youths desire to take up career in aviation must be determined and focused.
“Being a pilot is a skill, there is no sitting on the fence, you are either a pilot or you are not. It takes a lot to be a female pilot but you are going to be around and if you are grounded as a woman you can loss your track”.
Highlights of the conference was the presentation of scholarships to four participants including a student of the Mohammad Airport secondary school to be trained in ticketing and reservation, travel and tourism, among others.