Here's a link to a post from 4 years ago, seems very prophetic given the current climat in PH.
Link
Old 21st Feb 2011
gwelo shamwari
Plans to replace expatriate pilots!!! Really?
The Nation - Plans to replace expatriate pilots
Plans to replace expatriate pilots
Font size: Our Reporter 15/02/2011 00:00:00
The Managing Director of Bristow Helicopters, Capt. Akin Oni, has said the company has put a policy in place to replace all existing expatriate pilots and engineers with Nigerians by 2015.
Oni, who disclosed this last week in Lagos at a press conference, said the helicopter company had trained some Nigerian pilots overseas who would join the organisation soon.
He stated that the replacement would be done in phases as the training of pilots and engineers to attain professionalism takes about seven years.
"I am proud that today there are eight Nigerians who are coming after their graduation in the United States. We expect to receive them, who have in the last years trained as helicopter pilots. They will be graduating in a couple of weeks. So, in another four weeks, we expect them back in Nigeria," Capt. Oni said.
However, the managing director said the company would like to do the training in Nigeria, but regretted that the Nigerian College of Aviation Technology (NCAT), Zaria has not got a helicopter training school.
He added that there were plans to start helicopter training at NCAT and that "when that happens we will stop the training in the United States."
Oni also said that the company was working with the NCAT management to build a hangar at the college.
"At NCAT, we are we are putting money into the classrooms and very soon we expect aeronautical engineers to come in from the United States. We have signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with the college. So, there is nothing stopping us from investing in Zaria. Also the equipment we have been waiting for have arrived in Nigeria and the next thing is the delivery of the equipment to Zaria," he added.
He further said: "So very soon, we will be renovating the hangar at NCAT, we are putting money into the classrooms, next month we expect, two aeronautical engineering instructors to come in, from the United States, these two persons will be at the aviation training college in Zaria, we signed a memorandum of understanding, nothing is stoping from going ahead with our plans to invest in Zaria, so the equipment we have been waiting for , for Zaria will arrive soon, is on going ,we have spend energy and time to invest in the training of eight Nigerians , today we have eight in the US, academy , we expect four trained as helicopter pilots, they will graduate very soon.
We are doing training of helicopter pilots abroad because NCAT does not have the capacity , it is yet to get an chopper training school, there are plans there, we have the largest helicopter training school in the world to assist NCAT, there is a lot to learn and we are wiling to assist, we are doing a lot.
The challenge is that there is a gestation period for pilots, and engineers, we are faced with that , we do not have the capacity to train enough pilots and engineers in Nigeria, that is why we are engaging foreign pilots and engineers, when we have enough Nigerians we will replace the foreign professionals, but it is even more challenging now that we have category one, we need to work more on how to replace highly experienced experts with Nigerians, knowing the gestation period of such professionals.
We will still need to engage some foreigners until we bridge the gap."