Four major unions in the Nigerian aviation industry have accused the Director of Human Resources and Administration of the Nigeria Civil Aviation Authority (NCAA), Mr Wakil Adamu, of “gross incompetence” concerning workers’ welfare.
The unions also alleged that the director is currently a Director in Jos Electricity Distribution Company (JEDC), thereby contravening Schedule V, Part I (Code of Conduct for Public Officers), Section 2(b) of the Nigerian Constitution 1999 (as amended).
The unions are the Air Transport Services Senior Staff Association (ATSSSAN), the National Union of Air Transport Employees (NUATE), the National Association of Aircraft Pilots and Engineers (NAAPE), and the Association of Nigeria Aviation Professionals (ANAP).
The accusations: In a two-page petition signed by their General Secretaries and addressed to the Minister of Aviation, Sen. Hadi Sirika, the unions alleged that the Director has failed to discharge his duties as expected.
According to the petitioners, the receipt of letters of utmost importance to the interests of workers and the agency is never acknowledged or attended to by the department.
They accused Adamu of de-motivating the workers through his action as those who were due for promotion were never promoted due to his refusal to conduct required examinations for the staff.
Lack of promotions: The unions purported that some of the workers who were due for promotion in the last eight years were never promoted, while recommendations on how to secure the approval of the NCAA Staff Conditions of Service (CoS) from the National Salaries, Incomes and Wages Commission were never heeded to.
The unions further alleged that some letters dated September 2021 bothering on workers’ welfare were meant to be delivered to the Director General Civil Aviation (DGCA), Capt. Musa Nuhu never got to him to date.
For instance, the unions claimed that a particular letter, dated July 2022 was written to the DGCA, after consultations with the then Permanent Secretary of the Ministry of Aviation on the stagnation of some Level 14 and above officers who they alleged had been on same grade level for about eight years, but was never received by the DGCA.
They stated that the affected staff had written and passed the required promotion examinations, yet were never promoted by the agency.
The unions threatened that they were prepared to provide concrete evidence against Adamu if called upon to do so by the minister. Part of the petition said:
- “The section of the Code of Conduct for Public Officers states that: ‘Without prejudice to the generality of the foregoing paragraph, a public officer shall not (a) receive or be paid the emoluments of any public office at the same time as he receives or is paid the emoluments of any other public office.’
- “It is pathetically disheartening that our unions would be pushed to this present state of frustration in our relationship with the Nigeria Civil Aviation Authority (NCAA) through the ineptitude of the Office of the Director of Human Resource and Admin (DHR) of NCAA, currently occupied by Wakil Adamu.
- “The Directorate of Human Resource is reasonably presumed to be the gateway between the management and the workers in any organisation; but reverse is regrettably the case in NCAA of nowhere: Letters that concern workers’ welfare that is written by the Unions to the Director General Civil Aviation (DGCA), and minuted to the DHR, never got to the DGCA.
- “Receipt of letters of utmost importance to the interests of workers, and by extension, the interests of the organisation are never acknowledged and even several letters of reminder on inactions of the directorate of human resource and admin remain brazenly discountenanced without the necessary acknowledgement.”
The unions appealed to Sirika to intervene in the situation before it degenerated further, maintaining that the director had continued to pull the agency backwards.
