A man who was picked up by a helicopter in the middle of a huge traffic jam in Nigeria had suffered a stroke, the helicopter company has told the BBC.

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The video from Sunday spread widely on social media, with many speculating it showed a billionaire who had called the helicopter to escape the four-hour long traffic jam.

The video provoked condemnation about the behaviour of Nigeria’s super rich.

But the helicopter operator says it is normal to respond to emergency calls.

The luxury brand Julian’s Luxury appears to have been one of the first to spread the idea that the video showed a billionaire being rescued from a traffic jam.

“Real Luxury Lifestyle… the Power of Money… picking up a VIP who is stuck in traffic on the Lagos Benin Expressway,” it said.

Another rumour that spread was that the helicopter was rescuing the girlfriend of a billionaire.

This theory was put forward by actor Deyemi Okanlawon who went on to condemn the act as “lawlessness”.

Three days later, on Wednesday, Nigeria’s Civil Aviation authority said that it had launched an investigation into the incident.

Femi Adeniji from Tropical Arctic Logistics Ltd told the BBC that he didn’t understand why the video had caused such a fuss.

He said it was normal for their company to respond to emergency situations, as there is no such public emergency service available – and they had done so six times in the last two months.

He said that there was no truth in the speculation that the helicopter was called by a billionaire who wanted to escape the huge traffic jam.

Instead he said that the man had been suffering from high blood pressure and his driver had panicked.

A doctor who was also stuck in the traffic was helping the man and the helicopter was called.

It landed on Ore road which connects the south west to the southern part of Nigeria.

Air Peace has perceived a subtle lack of synergy among certain agencies within the aviation industry and states that this is affecting airlines and stakeholders the wrong way as well as hampering progress.

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The airline was explaining certain issues that transpired following reports of its hard landing on May 15, 2019,` which the accident investigation bureau had claimed the airline did not report.

Captain Victor Egonu, the airline’s chief pilot while speaking with newsmen explained that  harmony in working together will reduce unnecessary tension around the industry as well as the escalation of certain trivialities

According to him, with what has happened, the  AIB is creating a gray area about what is to be termed a serious accident or and incident especially as the AIB handbook does not say anything about a hard landing being a serious incident.

He said most of what happened was avoidable if agencies would work together.

“We strongly believe that NCAA and AIB should work together, you’re not competing against each other, you are there to complement one another. You have your specialty which is investigating incidents and accidents but the NCAA is the overall regulatory body. When we have instances where we have air misses, we do not write or contact NAMA. We don’t have a direct interaction with NAMA, what we do is we contact NCAA, NCAA then contacts NAMA.

NCAA collects the record from the tower and then invites us and NAMA to NCAA to go over the recordings and all. So if that affinity is there between NAMA, FAAN and NCAA why AIB outside that umbrella, I fail to understand,” he queried.

He said the airline’s aircraft tire had picked up a Foreign Object Damage (FOD) in Abuja on its tires and wonders if that is to be reported as a serious incident since the AIB is asking for MORs

“To bring you up to date…we had a tire incident at Abuja airport and we change the tire, now should we report a tire burst to the AIB? The AIB is trying to create a gray area

“We don’t know is whether we should report tire burst to AIB. The thing is first it’s a minor thing unfortunately it has happened and we just changed the tires but the thing is AIB is trying to create a grey area where what is the definition of serious incident or accident. I went through their books and there’s nothing here that talks about hard landing, so how do we define what is hard landing and what is reportable.

Explaining the chain further, Captain Egonu said, “As an airline we don’t feel we have to report our Mandatory Occurrence Report (MOR) to multiple agencies. We have given our MOR to the NCAA, and NCAA is the umbrella body, the seriousness of an accident depends on them, they now call in AIB and to hand it to AIB to take over so having handed in the MOR to NCAA as far as we are concerned we complied with the requirements of the law.

The chief pilot expressed disappointment at the insinuation that the airline was hiding incidents stating that if the AIB requires the airline to send every MOR to it that can be arranged but to say it doesn’t report those incidents is far from the truth.

“With that aircraft, for people to say that we tried to shield information from the authorities and we were not transparent, its being economical with the truth. I think we have done everything we can do, we did not try to circumvent any rules

“Other airlines have had similar and even worse issues than we have had and it has not been reported the way ours have. I think we should all be treated with the same hand. Can we be better yes, we can.

“The last thing we want is an accident for air peace or any airline in Nigeria, if accidents happen it affects all of us, passenger levels drops and everyone’s passenger figures are affected. It affects everybody.

On the state and airworthiness of that aircraft that is in the new, the Air Peace Chief Pilot said the airline has cxontacted the aircraft manufacturers and after theitr analysis and subject to NCAA’s approval, the airline can choose to repair the aircraft or not.

“We contacted the aircraft manufacturer Boeing. They gave us tests to run and do, all the tests have been done and we are waiting for them to come back to us and tell us what to do with the aircraft. We are waiting forthem to tell us what to do with the aircraft, we also have to ascertain if the damage is something we can repair in Nigeria or if we are takin it out of the country to repair it and if we are taking it out can we actually take it out of Nigeria.

“The aircraft hasn’t moved because we are waiting to get correct information from the manufacturers on what we require to be done. when we get the information we would have to submit this to the NCAA airworthiness, they will go through it and if they are satisfied which i am sure they will be because this is coming from the manufacturers they will now allow us to go ahead with the repairs, like I said, its left for us to decide do we repair the aeroplane.

On safety and training of its crew, Captain Egonu said , “We are one airline that go out of our way to ensure safety . According to regulation, every six months pilots undergo 8hours recurrent training bit but here at Air peace we do almost double that every six months, we do 12 hours recurrent training. We do this for safety to get the pilot to standard.

” We have 136 pilots and all these pilots undergo this recurrent training and some of them fail, but at air peace, we give them the opportunity to retake the recurrency at no expense and if they fail again we then let them go.

 

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Nigerian carrier, Air Peace, is becoming a well known name around the globe. Now, the airline is almost ready to begin their first long haul international service in July. According to CH-Aviation, the carrier plans to start service between their base in Lagos and Sharjah in the UAE.It is the first step in Air Peace’s huge international expansion plans, with ambitions to fly as far afield as Houston and Guangzhou.

The Sharjah flights

The flights between Lagos and Sharjah will commence on Friday 5th July, and will operate three times per week using one of Air Peace’s Boeing 777s.

The flights will push back from Lagos early evening for the overnight flight to Sharjah. After a three hour turnaround, it is a morning flight back to Lagos from Sharjah, arriving in Nigeria’s biggest city in time for lunch.

Air Peace’s 777s are a three class product, and although second hand, they are well equipped. Two have come from Emirates and one from Singapore Airlines. The interesting thing is that these aircraft retain their predecessor’s cabin seats, making the reasonably inexpensive premium cabin prices on Air Peace an interesting proposition.

Air Peace’s 777s are a three class product, and although second hand, they are well equipped. Two have come from Emirates and one from Singapore Airlines. The interesting thing is that these aircraft retain their predecessor’s cabin seats, making the reasonably inexpensive premium cabin prices on Air Peace an interesting proposition.

These plans have been greeted with some scepticism. United withdrew its flights between Houston and Lagos in 2016, saying that while the two oil capitals appreciated the air link, there wasn’t enough traffic to sustain their 787 flights. Additionally, the Nigerian government was imposing tight currency controls on United, making it difficult to get cash back to the USA. 

Air Peace seems to think it can make a better go of the route.

China’s strategy of ploughing investment dollars into developing countries like Nigeria arouses controversy, but seems unstoppable. China has sent billions of dollars into Nigeria and other African nations in the form of loans and investments, including in their airports.

The practice may be raising the ire of western nations who fear Chinese expansionism. However, it creates new ties between old Commonwealth countries like Nigeria and new forces in the global economy such as China.

The investment links between Nigeria and China may be the reasoning behind Air Peace’s proposed Lagos – Guangzhou flights. 

Overall

With a prolific influx of foreign carriers not to mention the behemoth that is Ethiopian Airlines to contend with, it’s great to see a home grown African airline reaching out to the world. While Houston and London may be some time off, we’re looking forward to seeing Air Peace in their pretty livery arriving in the UAE.

Will you fly Air Peace from Sharjah? Where do you think they should fly next? Let us know in the comments!

The Founder, Tony Elumelu Foundation, Tony Elumelu has stressed the importance of empowering young Palestinians to ignite the entrepreneurial ecosystem and strengthen the Palestinian economy. 

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He said that young Palestinians must be empowered with jobs and economic opportunity to contribute meaningfully to their nation’s development.

Elumelu made this known at the Peace to Prosperity Workshop in Bahrain, organised by the Presidency of the United States of America in partnership with the host government, the Kingdom of Bahrain, to launch the US growth strategy for Palestine and the Middle East; a first step in the long journey towards establishing an enduring future for the region; the West Bank, Gaza, and beyond.

“I come from Africa; and the reality is that we do have a lot of similarities with the Palestinian people; especially in the area of demographic make up. 

“With over 60% of its nearly 5 million strong population under 30, the young people of Palestine need Jobs Jobs and more Jobs! Without jobs, there will be no economic hope. Big corporations and government alone cannot supply the jobs demanded by Palestine’s demographic pressures. 

“We need SMEs and startups to address joblessness in the region, create jobs and opportunities in local communities for millions of our Palestinian young brothers and sisters to become employed, meaningfully engaged, and full of economic hope, which in turn leads them away from extremism.”

The renowned investor and philanthropist, who has committed US$100m to empower young African entrepreneurs through Tony Elumelu Foundation, called on endowed Middle Easterners and their philanthropies to step up and become more involved in empowering the young ones of Palestine.

“In the 21st century, we cannot keep relying on western donors to help empower our own people; we must step up and create a platform where they may partner with us for scale, just as we are doing at the Tony Elumelu Foundation.”

“The Tony Elumelu Foundation annually identities and empowers entrepreneurs across all of Africa’s 54 countries with a non-refundable seed capital of $5000 each, mentoring and training, and in over five years, has supported 7,520 young Africans. 

To resolve joblessness in the region, Mr Elumelu offered his Foundation’s unique economic empowerment model to be replicated in Palestine. 

“Young Palestinian people need similar opportunities like the ones we currently give young African entrepreneurs through the Tony Elumelu Foundation. 

“We acknowledge that given Africa’s huge numbers, we are touching only a top of the iceberg, but we have seen first-hand how this model transforms individual lives, families, communities and cities.” Elumelu said.

He also called on the government to play its own role in supporting and prioritising the young people of Palestine.

“Governments must play their own role: ensuring good governance is in place, prioritising infrastructure and the fight against corruption, and creating an enabling and conducive environment so that when these young Palestinians get opportunities, they can succeed.”

“As an investor, something that speaks volumes to me when I want to choose a country to invest in is this: is the private sector in that environment doing well? 

“Do they have small and medium scale enterprises that are flourishing? This to me is the real signal of how successful my investment will be because what it is good for local investors is good for international investors. 

“If economic conditions for local investors are not favorable, they can’t be for foreign investors. The government must ensure that local SMEs thrive to signal to the global investment community that Palestine is open for business.” He said.

Meanwhile, The UBA Chairman commended the US Government for the timely initiative and intervention but counseled on the importance of longevity and sustainability. 

“For what we are gathered here to be sustainable, endure over time and lead to sustained prosperity, we must involve the Palestine people. “Until we collectively agree that any economic plan we put in place for Palestine and the region must be anchored by and on the small and medium scale enterprises to be permanent and fundamentally address the issues, we will continue to rely on quick fixes. We must prioritise inclusive growth that brings all to the table – women and youth especially – which in turn will create more hope and beget more security and peace. 

“To achieve this, there must be a collaboration between the Palestinian people, friends of Palestine, neighbours of Palestine, and led by the wealthy and endowed elite in the Middle East, to work together to economically empower young Palestinians. It is not too difficult a task for us to touch significant numbers out of the 2-3 million youth in the region.”

He noted that The Tony Elumelu Foundation is ready to deploy its expertise in collaboration with the wealthy elite from the Middle East region, to create an affirmative plan, and send a strong message of hope for the Palestinian young people. 

Tony stated: If we prioritise them and create the right future for them, we will signal a new beginning in this part of the world. Only then will we achieve security and peace permanently because these young people will become inclusive stakeholders and the true champions of prosperity.”

Other Global leaders in attendance at the Workshop include US Treasury Secretary, Steven Mnuchin; King of Bahrain, Hamad bin Isa Al Khalifa; World Bank President, Mr David Malpass; Chief Executive Officer, Emaar, Amit Jain; and Blackstone CEO, Stephen Schwarzman.