If this is another toothless carnivore like NAAPE, it better RIP. I am both a pilot and an aircraft maintenance engineer with FAA, JAA and NCAA Licences. As i write, about half of the 750 pilots flying in Nigeria are foreigners, at the expense of the over 50 and increasing army of unemployed commercial pilots (though mostly CPL holders). Having trained in both US and Europe, it is an impossibility to get a pilot/engineer in most countries. India, has just ruled that by the end of year 2011, there should be no foreign pilot operating in their country. Even within our sister African countries Ghana, Kenya, RSA name them, you can hadly get a job in these sister countries. Meanwhile, we have a good crowd of sister African country pilots operating here in Nigeria.
One reason always used to deceive the airlines and our goverment is that we do not have enough pilots. That is not very true. With rgds Captains - yeah, but with rgds FOs - neah. They claim that you require at least 1500hrs to fly as an airline FO. This is not stated anywhere in the NCAR or even the FAR or JAR. While it is desirable to have more experienced flight crews, it is not always practicable especially in many countries. While in the USA, the competition for airline flight crew job is intense because of the huge pilot population of over 720,000 scrambling for front seats on airliners from their intemediary hours building flying such as flight instructing in flight schools, regionals, military and a vibrant GA. It is not exactly this way in Europe and other nations where there is a not so vibrant or total absence of intermediaries. it is quite common to see FOs on the jet airlines with under 400hrs in these countries.
Sometime last year, i wrote to the Honourable Minister of Aviation on this issue. Ofcourse, as expected, it most likely ended up in the bin where regressives of Nigerian aviation would want it to be so that the staus quo is maintained.
It is high time that we come together, form a formidable and powerful pilot/engineer association that will protect our interest and ensure aviation development to the satisfaction of all stakeholders.