The
Senate will on Tuesday resume after its sallah break to consider
various contending national issues, including the current crisis
rocking the aviation industry.
The Senate had summoned the Minister
of Aviation, Mrs. Stella Oduah, and heads of agencies under the
ministry to appear before it in order to explain the real state of the
aviation industry.
The decision was taken after the
Senators exhaustively discussed a motion moved by senator Hope Uzodima
from Imo West Senatorial District, who drew the attention of his
colleagues to the air crash involving a 23 year-old Propeller aeroplane
on the fleet of the Associated Airlines three weeks ago.
Uzodima had expressed concern that the
incident which had left families of the victims in agonies and pains,
had underscored the need for the country to re-examine its aviation
sector to ascertain the real causes of frequent crashes.
He also observed with regret that the
propeller airplane bearing the remains of a former governor of Ondo
State, Dr. Olusegun Agagu, from Lagos to Akure, crashed barely one
minute after it took off from the domestic wing of the Murtala Muhammed
Airport in Ikeja.
The lawmaker also noted that the
incident which was the seventh in the series of fatal crashes that had
claimed the lives of notable Nigerians between June 2, 2012 and October
3, 2013, was “suggestive of a deep seated systemic problem that must
be resolved to avert further occurrence.”
The session, presided over by the
Deputy Senate President, Senator Ike Ekweremadu, therefore unanimously
agreed to summon the aviation minister and the chief executive officers
of all the agencies under her supervision to explain the true state of
the aviation sector.
Ekweremadu, had while ruling on the
submission of the senate, clarified that the invitation of Oduah and
the heads of the aviation agencies was not an indictment of their
competence.
Rather, he said the occasion would
afford the aviation chiefs, an opportunity to state their efforts at
implementing past reports and recommendations of the Senate aimed at
ensuring safety and sanity in the aviation industry.
He had said, “The observation of lapses
in the aviation industry expressed by the senators is not also an
indictment of the senate committee on aviation.”
The Chairman, Senate Committee on
Information, Media and Public Affairs, Senator Eyinnaya Abaribe, while
briefing journalists after the plenary said the invitation of the
minister was pursuant to section 67 (2) of the 1999 Constitution.
Abaribe added that since the invitation
extended to the aviation chiefs was for them to appear before the
plenary, the minister and her top officers would appear before the
Senate after its resumption on October 22.
Also, Abaribe had said that there was no
formal allegation against Oduah, over the N255m bulletproof car
scandal before the Senate.
PUNCH
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