Capt. Ibrahim Mshelia is a pilot, an administrator and founder of Mish Aviation Flying School. He has had flying experience spanning over 32 years.
As far as aviation is concerned, he is a stickler for detail. In this interview with IME AKPAN, Mshelia says among other things that the devaluation of the naira will affect aviation training.He is of the view that aviation training institutions should be treated like universities and argues that foreign carriers are making fortunes out of Nigeria while the domestic airlines struggle to stay afloat
Of late, there has been a debate on the devaluation of the naira and the exchange rate of the currency to a dollar has been undulating. Do you see this development affecting your business?
Certainly it will! Our clients mainly come from Nigeria and this adds up to how much naira they would need to buy the dollars they remit to us. It has the potential to slow down or even kill the training (institutions) in the industry. This is one of the problems I highlighted earlier. In Europe and the Americas, banks may employ in-house or keep on contract professional aviation consultants to advise them on effects of policies before they are pronounced and implemented, but in Nigeria and most African countries, the way we see policies emerge, appears as if those in position deliberately or ignorantly fail to seek professional advice.
We need to stop and look back and emulate greater values. Secondly, those who find themselves in governments must realise that training institutions are not airlines and should be treated as all other universities or schools. This has been a mistake that needs to be addressed very quickly if we want our aviation training schools to survive. The only way we can quit dependence on other developed economies for training we can easily do here at home locally ourselves. Our general mentality of going abroad for this or that must stop to make meaningful progress in every aspect of our national developments across Africa. It hurts me that we are still living the values of the 19th century but in the 21st. It is very painful indeed, not when we have Africans at National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), Wall Street, etc.
How has the recurring jet fuel crisis in Nigeria affected your operations and what would you proffer as possible solutions?
We do not use Jet fuel, we use Aviation Gasoline (Avgas 100LL) we also have our own depot and purchase our fuel directly from the USA and do not therefore experience fuel problem ever. We bought two ISO tanks of 25,000 litres each and rotate them between the USA and our facility in Accra.
The Ghanaian government has helped us greatly by granting us our own license to import and dispense our own fuel without having to deal with fuel marketers
. Being professionals, we time the fuel need and delivery in such a manner that we have a ‘never see dry’ approach. That way we always have fuel at Mish Aviation for our training.
As a training institution, what is your perception of Nigeria’s aviation industry?
Since the deregulation of the aviation sector several decades ago, the Nigerian aviation industry has evolved. The industry has so much potential; though one would say it has not been exploited fully to the larger benefit of the country due to the inability of the industry players to exhibit the honesty, sincerity, ethics and professionalism required. In addition, successive governments have also not been able to successfully check the incessant corruption within the service providers. Neither the government agencies nor the airlines have been able to appoint honest leaders as the workers themselves have failed to stop pilfering company’s income. A lot has gone wrong with little or no effort to right the wrongs over the years. One wonders why major European, American and other carriers in the Middle East and Africa are making daily flights, with some doing even two frequencies daily while Nigerian aviation, on the domestic front is only but struggling with no hope in sight for reciprocity. All these problems lead to low employment for the locals and in effect reduce clientele for the training institutions such as Mish Aviation.
Partnership is a strategy for modern business growth. What has been your approach to both local and foreign partnership?
Aviation training institutions such as ours is not a typical buy and selling business. Partnership is not synonymous with this business, rather collaboration. We all collaborate when need arises. We are discussing with the Nigeria College of Aviation Technology (NCAT), our elder brother for this collaboration. For instance, we are currently discussing a collaboration, which we at Mish stand to benefit from, being that we are much younger and smaller. That’s the kind of collaboration that we have in our sector of the industry.
What is your advice to aviation authorities in West Africa on how to improve the sector?
Be more serious and understand that there is a difference between training institution and airline operation. Governments should exercise some tax-free regimes to encourage growth of new investors and also reduce tariff that lead to higher ticket cost. Aviation is an economic driver of modern times.
As consumers of aviation tools, we need to zero tariff on all imports of aircraft and accessories, encourage investors reasonably to sustain their business so they partner Government in return in areas of training sponsorships and affordable air transportation. We need to start production industries as well with the aim of producing our own aircraft and spares in the future. This can be done collectively as Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) or Africa Union. It’s quite possible and I am a very strong believer that we can deliver within the next 25 years if we start today. We have many raw materials and several of our citizens are in top manufacturing industries positions across the world today. We also know now that knowledge transfer is not a secret treasure as it used to be those days. We can copy blue prints and develop from there if we are serious.
The business of training aviation professionals has become increasingly competitive. What is your impression of the growing competition and how do you intend to manage it?
We do not see the competition at Mish Aviation; we get our clients as and when we have slots open. There are only 3 schools doing what we do in the entire sub Saharan Africa and we are the only privately owned flying school among them. You can see from there that bureaucracy of Government is eliminated completely. We deliver on time and quality. So we really do not have any competition at all. Plus, we have ‘cut our coat according to our size’ business ideology, so we are doing just fine by God’s grace.
