Oba, Nigeria has a reputation for corruption, along with fraud and drug trafficking. In the first world the mere mention of anything Nigerian rings alarm bells. Would you trust a letter of credit (supposedly) issued by a Nigerian bank for example ?
Bribery, or "dash" as you call it is ingrained in your culture to the extent were it is impossible to operate in Nigeria without it. This rightly raises the question of the integrity of your licencing system. How much for a peek at the ATPL exam papers ? To pass a flight test ? Even a complete licence issued on the strength of a forged foreign one.
And you wonder why Nigerian Airlines are banned from much of the worlds airspace.
I saw the transformation of Air Zimbabwe from an all white pilot group, to a mixed pilot group, to a now virtually all black pilot group.
Some of the issues worth mentioning were:
1. A group of black pilots (and one token white) were issued with ATPLs on the basis of a ministerial directive. They couldn't pass the exams which were based on the British system. Later on FAA ATPs became eligable for conversion so problem solved. Note the licencing officer T.W. a man of integrity resigned over this.
2. Senior training captain summoned to Prime Ministers office and accused of racism for not passing a black pilot as captain. Training captain sneekily failed an engine after take off and was treated to a close look at the control tower for his trouble.
This is the sort of thing SAA has to look foward to, if it's not happening already.
The Zimbabwe licence used to be highly regarded, and many pilots got jobs with Cathay, Australian Airlines, Singapore, Gulf Air etc .
With the large population base in Nigeria, there will obviously be some talented pilots in there. Provided he or she has a licence from a country were they can't be bought, such as Canada, New Zealand, UK etc, and is flying for an airline not under pressure to promote on race regardless of ability then I will happily fly with him/her.
Unfortunately blacks have shown themselves unable to successfully run a country, with one or two exceptions such as Botswana. Why does most of Nigeria's population live in poverty when it has vast oil wealth ? I am not a racist just a realist. In my new job I am going to be working for non whites (Singaporeans), now these people do impress me with their ability to run a country and an airline.
I used to live in Africa, saw the writing on the wall and got out thank God.
PS.
Extracts from the "Upset South African" thread currently running.