TCAA pilot funding program- Tanzania
Join Date: Jul 2008
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This is typical of the corruption endemic in East Africa and not surprising in the least that TCAA has impunity - where else in the world would a regulator be allowed to setup a training fund and blackmail operators into paying into it. Corruption at its worst, especially when they hold the AOC to ransom. Furthermore, imagine the impact on safety from putting comercial pressures onto the operators to pay up. And yes the 'look at me I'm the big Capt.' cultural mentality of the local juniors in Tz is a total joke - anybody can put stripes on their shoulder, its when you get in an aircraft where we find out if you have any talent (which they invariably don't). The biggest problem and across Africa is this mentality that you have to have every pilot from your own country and so long as you can tick that box, nothing else matters. This results in an undermining of the knowledge and skills base that eventually jeaopardises safety. For this reason, I don't fly Air Botswana any more - they took a kid that was rejected by Delta Air who couldn't tie his shoe-lace let alone fly and put him in the right-seat of an ATR just because he was local and held a local licence. Flying should be based around a few key things and race/nationality shouldn't be one of them. Skill, knowledge, attitude, ability, safety-focus etc should be what a pilot is measured by, nothing more, nothing less. Look around the world and you'll see pilots of all colours and races in Emirates, Qatar, Cathay etc.....and they all got their by being competent and meeting the standards. Seems like Africa and particularly corrupt states like Tz will never learn this lesson.
Join Date: Sep 2008
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It's not just Africa. But Africa as a continent is the worst when it comes to graft and cronyism. I've worked for an African airline and we were "encouraged" to train some folks to proficiency. 200 hours and still no sign off, thankfully management saw the light and took a certain cadet and future cadets out of the program.
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I agree that generic corruption etc. ain't just in Africa but this is the first time I have ever heard of an 'independent' regulator imposing this training cost on operators, as a regulator, the job is to regulate, nothing more - I wonder if ICAO know about this?
African countries will only oblige if their greasy palms are greased - which ICAO will not do....
