The last may not have been heard of the controversial N174 billion debts allegedly incurred by the ministry of aviation as the Federal Airports Authority of Nigeria (FAAN) said the figure was inflated by N26 billion.
Documents obtained from FAAN and outlining the financial commitments of the agency to the ongoing airport remodeling projects put the debts at N148 billion and not N174 billion announced by the senate committee on aviation
According to the document, the first phase of the airport remodelling programme gulped N12.81 billion, with N11.22 billion as total amount already paid and an outstanding balance of N1.58 billion.
FAAN also put the contract value of phase two at N93.43 billion, with N53.97 billion disbursed to the contractors, leaving a balance of the N39.50 billion. The document also stated that the third phase of the projects which is still in embryo at this stage has contract value of N63.02 billion with N4.21 billion already paid leaving N58.81 billion as outstanding.
These, according to the document, bring the sub-total of the debts to N99.85 billion and when added to N48.37 billion debts already approved by the federal executive council sum up to N148.23 billion.
A breakdown of projects embarked upon since 2011 by the federal government include the rehabilitation, expansion and restructuring of airport terminals, building of 14 fresh cargo terminals, provision of equipment for the Accident Investigation Bureau (AIB) and the Nigerian Meteorological Agency (NIMET) among others.
It would be recalled that the ministry of aviation, in collaboration with the ministry of finance, the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) and with the consent and endorsement of the national assembly committees on aviation made fiscal provisions for the funding of the projects which were later abandoned by the ministry of aviation, hence the accumulated debts.
The three sources of funding for the projects include accruals from the Bilateral Air Service Agreement (BASA), appropriations and internally generated revenue.
Funding also came from approval for the presidential priority projects on February 21, 2011 for the utilisation of $60 million in the BASA fund which was submitted to the national assembly for appropriation to be supplemented by a further N14. 6 billion from FAAN’s internally generated revenue
However, plans are afoot to introduce other sources of funding which include airport development levy and security surcharges.
