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Nigeria, US meet on airport security, CAT1 certification

By Businessnews Staff on September 11, 2014

Nigeria and the United States are scheduled to meet shortly to address issues pertaining to security at the nation’s airports.

Ahead of the meeting scheduled to take place in Washington, the Minister of Aviation, Mr. Osita Chidoka, and the US Ambassador to Nigeria, Mr. James Entwistle, met in Abuja on Tuesday and held preliminary talks.

Speaking to journalists at the end of the closed door meeting, Chidoka said Nigeria needed to tap into the US expertise to make the nation’s airports more secure.

He also confirmed that the Category One certification, which the US granted to Nigeria some years ago, would also be top of the agenda of the Washington meeting.

Chidoka said, “There is a Category One issue. We shall be tapping into USA expertise on security issues; and on the Category One, we are doing a lot on our safety and security standards at the airports and we want to deepen that by ensuring that not only do we have the Category One status; we are also going beyond that by ensuring that all our safety and security systems are world class.

“We want to ensure that the next certification process will be just per functionary. So, we are thinking that there is a lot of cooperation from the US in terms of capacity building and regulatory improvements, and also in terms of commercial improvement. We want to encourage more airlines to grow their fleet and have the capacity to provide service to Nigerians.”

On the other hand, Entwistle said, “I am here because I want to pay my respect to Chidoka in particular, because aviation is an area in which USA and Nigeria have always worked and collaborated on.

“He is travelling to Washington shortly to have discussions with the relevant agencies. So, we had to talk about that because aviation is a crucial sector when it comes to safety and security. Also, I talked to the minister; we want to create the opportunity for US products to come to Nigeria.”

The ambassador also spoke on the collaboration between Nigeria and the US in the fight against the Ebola Virus Disease.

Entwistle said, “The situation of Ebola in this country is being properly handled; there is a very good response from the government – very rapid response from the government’s health officials. Even when the virus spread to Port Harcourt, the reaction was very swift.

“I have been very impressed with my visits to the various centres set up for treating the patients, and they are doing a very good job. The key issues are contact tracing, public information, isolation units and all these things; the government is doing very well.”

He added, “The US government, especially the Centre for Disease Control, is glad to help. And as I keep saying to people, the situation with Ebola in Nigeria is fundamentally different from the situation in Liberia, Sierra Leone and Guinea. So far here in the country, things are going pretty well.

“The important thing in Nigeria is that all of the cases can be traced back to the original index case. That is pretty good because the contact tracers are doing a very good job.”

He added that the present measure being put in place at the airports for Nigeria-bound passengers through attaching names to seats would go a long way in curtailing the spread of the disease.

[Punch]

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