Olotu: We must not allow anyone to divide NANTA

The NANTA election is about two weeks from now or close to that, what are your plans for NANTA?
It is good to let you know what I have in store for NANTA because NANTA has come a long way to where we are today, to God be the glory. Kudos to all the elders because of what they have done by growing this body and it is moving forward. I see myself as one of the apostles who should not allow NANTA to die; that is why I am contesting to contribute my quota and give back. I have been a member of NANTA for 24 years and in the industry for a total of 35 years, I have a plan to be all-inclusive because when you look at what is going on now. My opponent is campaigning to segregate a section of NANTA because, by our business models, we have Go Lite and Go-Standard depending on which one you adopt. My opponent is campaigning as if he is the one who brought Go-Lite. I was part of the people, part of Bankole Bernard’s administration that started Go-Lite. Go-Lite has been functioning. You can rejig a business model like what has happened to Go-Lite. I am happy that Go-Lite is actually thriving and moving forward but on the other hand, we have Go-Standard and it depends on which one you want to choose. Two, we must not allow anybody even the person who is claiming to be Baba Go-Lite today not know when Go-Lite was birthed?. He was not part of NANTA. You cannot even claim to be Baba Go-Lite when you were not even there when Go-Lite was birthed. Kudos to Bankole Bernard during his administration and I was on that committee that gave birth to Go-Lite. Today, I am happy that Go-Lite has come to stay and to everybody operating under Go-Lite, let me say this to you, Go-Lite cannot do it alone. The more the merrier. We have to cooperate with Go-Standard. There must be a handshake between Go-Standard and Go-Lite. With this handshake, we will be able to be in charge of our businesses and that would enable us to be on top of this business. If we say Go-Lite alone, it will be like a bird flying with one hand but by the time you balance it up, both will have a bird flying. We have to team together. Don’t be deceived, Go-Lite cannot do it alone same way Go-Standard cannot do it alone. Go-Lite is tomorrow. As I said, the more the merrier. Victory will always be ours because we are indivisible NANTA but if we allow ourselves to be used and we divide NANTA, it will not favour anybody.

This forthcoming election has brought a lot of acrimony never before seen in NANTA in recent times. What do you think is responsible for this?
Thank you very much for your question. Someone is fanning the ember of discord in NANTA and I am not going to mention his name saying some group of elders, that one person pulled out of them and that was how that defiant follower of Jesus Christ pulled out of the followership of Jesus Christ and at the end of the day, he sold Jesus Christ out. If that person came out of the elders, it means that that person knows more than the elders or you are seeing tomorrow more than the elders. What I want to say to that person is that when that person pulled out from the group of elders, it is to destroy not to build. I am saying to that person that he should look at it critically. When a set of people are together and he is not doing something right, it is better to call that person to order. They are the ones heating the polity because, for me, I see no reason why somebody should pull out of the elders to say you are setting up your group to hijack the governance of NANTA. It doesn’t work that way. The reason he is doing that is to come out and tell us why he is doing that because you cannot tell us that all the elders are foolish. So many of them are retired but are in the business. Some of them have handed over the business to their children and they are running. If we destroy this business, what are we going to hand over to our children? I wouldn’t want that to happen even to the young ones that are coming up today. I am very sure most of the young ones coming up today want to have a business to give to their children. If you say to the elders that they don’t know what they are doing or manage NANTA very well, you will not even meet anything called NANTA. For somebody who was the national president, I don’t know what he is looking for. Ten years ago, the outgoing NANTA President, Susan Akporiaye came to talk to me in my office and begged me that I should support her. No election brought Susan in and my opponent was nowhere in NANTA even before four years and that should not be allowed at all because this guy knows nothing about NANTA in the four years that he came in and became NANTA Vice President. I was NANTA VP 12 years ago, I was the National Financial Secretary. If I open a can of worms about the palliative that was given to NANTA by the Federal Government during COVID; people got money and I am very sure I have facts with me that I can publish to people to see concerning this palliative but I don’t want to go there. Let us leave that for another day.

If you become NANTA President, what are the things you are going to do to make sure there is unity?
First of all, by the Grace of God if I become NANTA President call all of us together. There is going to be a symposium across Nigeria be Go-Lite and Go-Standard. We all operate under IATA licence and there is not going to be any division. We call everybody together and look at our issues, our problems. First is the Act that has been abandoned. We will look at how we can work around it. We will involve people in the academia and push this to the government and we want this Act. Once we get this Act, all this will never happen again. All this nonsense will not be happening. We will make everybody comfortable to play in their space.

I remember during Bankole Bernard’s tenure, they tried to sanitise the industry because of allegations of quackery and not fully registered members and came up with the idea of electronic ID cards, are you looking in that direction?
Before you tell the government to come and regulate you need to regulate yourself first. I was in that administration and I was the national financial secretary when this was birthed and to the glory of God, we launched a NANTA ID card. You just go to the airport and exchange it with an On-Duty Card (ODC) card and you will be able to enter anywhere in the airport which was a very laudable project but somebody came in and abandoned it or relegated it to the background. Those ID cards for members I am sure have all expired. The ID card is to be able to identify our members at any Embassy. They can scan it and see all your details and allow you to do anything you want to do in the Embassy. The ID card is still very necessary.

The travel industry with foreign airlines trapped funds released to them. How do we ensure this does not happen again?
This is not in the hands of anybody. This had to do with the general economy of the country and everybody knows that the government we have there today is doing everything to ensure we have a stable government and we have enough inflow of forex. The airlines too should request for their money when due so that they can move their money and not allow it to pile up.