Wealthy Nigerians Spend $6.5 Billion on Executive Jets in 5 Years
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Wealthy Nigerians Spend $6.5 Billion on Executive Jets in 5 Years
In a country where it is reported that nearly 100 million people live in less than $1 a day, super-rich Nigerians have increased their spending on private jets by more than 650% in the last 5 years and Bombardier says that it already has orders for the $65 million Global 6000 from Nigerian customers.
Lagos already has Nigeria's first $25 million private FBO, Evergreen Apple, whose CEO Segun Demuren is the son of the Director General of the NCAA, Doctor Harold Demuren
. The MD is John Goulet, former float plane pilot with Pan African Airlines, then Chevron auditor and latterly MD of Caverton Helicopters (a post from which he was fired the day after they signed the contract to take over the helicopter operations for Shell).
Lagos already has Nigeria's first $25 million private FBO, Evergreen Apple, whose CEO Segun Demuren is the son of the Director General of the NCAA, Doctor Harold Demuren
. The MD is John Goulet, former float plane pilot with Pan African Airlines, then Chevron auditor and latterly MD of Caverton Helicopters (a post from which he was fired the day after they signed the contract to take over the helicopter operations for Shell).
Wealthy Nigerians Spend A Reported $6.5 Billion On Private Jets
Within the last five years, some of Nigeria’s wealthiest people have spent about $6.5 billion acquiring new private jets, making it Africa’s biggest market for private planes, according to a new report.
In a report published Monday by Nigeria’s leading newspaper, Punch, the number of privately-owned aircraft in the country has risen by 650% between 2007 and 2012. In 2007, there were a total of 20 private jets in the country; today there are over 150.
According to the report, which cited documents sourced from aviation agencies, over 130 new private planes have been acquired since 2007 at an average cost of $50 million per plane. According to Tunji Abioye, the journalist who authored the report, the luxury trend is encouraged among the rich by “the need for privacy, fear of insecurity and the urgency required by modern business.”
The most common brands of private planes available in Nigeria today include Gulfstream 450, 550 and 650; Bombardier Challenger 604, 605; Global Express; Embraer Legacy and Falcons; and Hawker Siddeley 125-800 and 900XP. The owners of private jets in Nigeria typically range from corrupt high-flying politicians to oil magnates, business moguls and a few clergymen, the Punch article reports.
However, according to a quoted source from the report, it is pretty difficult to decipher the real identities of the owners because some of them “buy [the planes] through some foreign companies in North America, especially the US. The foreign company then leases it to another company in Nigeria.”
There are still several more private jets on the way, ordered by some of Nigeria’s wealthiest. While some will be delivered this year, others will arrive between 2013 and 2014. The increasing expenditure on private aircraft means that Nigeria is currently rivaling China as one of the two fastest growing markets for private jets in the world, and airplane manufacturers across the world are beginning to take notice.
Last week, Bombardier Aerospace, the world’s third-largest airplane manufacturer, kicked off a 16-African city marketing tour, with a four-day showcase of its latest offering, the $60 million Global 6000, in Nigeria, its most promising African market, according to a report by Ventures Africa.
Bombardier’s sales director for Africa, Robert Habjanic, told media correspondents that Nigeria was the company’s largest market in Africa. At the moment, about 35 Bombardier business jets are currently flying the country’s airspace. Habjanic also stated that the company already had orders for the Global 6000.
The number of acquisitions of private planes in Nigeria over the last decade has been unprecedented. Between March 2010 and March 2011, Nigerians spent $225 million on private jets.
The irony: While dozens of Nigerians are spending millions of dollars a piece for the luxury of private travel, the poverty level in the oil-rich country is continually on the rise; almost 100 million Nigerians, out of a total population of 170 million, live on less than a dollar a day.
Within the last five years, some of Nigeria’s wealthiest people have spent about $6.5 billion acquiring new private jets, making it Africa’s biggest market for private planes, according to a new report.
In a report published Monday by Nigeria’s leading newspaper, Punch, the number of privately-owned aircraft in the country has risen by 650% between 2007 and 2012. In 2007, there were a total of 20 private jets in the country; today there are over 150.
According to the report, which cited documents sourced from aviation agencies, over 130 new private planes have been acquired since 2007 at an average cost of $50 million per plane. According to Tunji Abioye, the journalist who authored the report, the luxury trend is encouraged among the rich by “the need for privacy, fear of insecurity and the urgency required by modern business.”
The most common brands of private planes available in Nigeria today include Gulfstream 450, 550 and 650; Bombardier Challenger 604, 605; Global Express; Embraer Legacy and Falcons; and Hawker Siddeley 125-800 and 900XP. The owners of private jets in Nigeria typically range from corrupt high-flying politicians to oil magnates, business moguls and a few clergymen, the Punch article reports.
However, according to a quoted source from the report, it is pretty difficult to decipher the real identities of the owners because some of them “buy [the planes] through some foreign companies in North America, especially the US. The foreign company then leases it to another company in Nigeria.”
There are still several more private jets on the way, ordered by some of Nigeria’s wealthiest. While some will be delivered this year, others will arrive between 2013 and 2014. The increasing expenditure on private aircraft means that Nigeria is currently rivaling China as one of the two fastest growing markets for private jets in the world, and airplane manufacturers across the world are beginning to take notice.
Last week, Bombardier Aerospace, the world’s third-largest airplane manufacturer, kicked off a 16-African city marketing tour, with a four-day showcase of its latest offering, the $60 million Global 6000, in Nigeria, its most promising African market, according to a report by Ventures Africa.
Bombardier’s sales director for Africa, Robert Habjanic, told media correspondents that Nigeria was the company’s largest market in Africa. At the moment, about 35 Bombardier business jets are currently flying the country’s airspace. Habjanic also stated that the company already had orders for the Global 6000.
The number of acquisitions of private planes in Nigeria over the last decade has been unprecedented. Between March 2010 and March 2011, Nigerians spent $225 million on private jets.
The irony: While dozens of Nigerians are spending millions of dollars a piece for the luxury of private travel, the poverty level in the oil-rich country is continually on the rise; almost 100 million Nigerians, out of a total population of 170 million, live on less than a dollar a day.
Last edited by Phone Wind; 20th Sep 2012 at 11:38. Reason: Error pointed out by chuks
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Let's cultivate them
Let's implore them, for several benefits.
(1) To employ local pilots and techs, who before-hand should be urged to shut up(with regard to any employers' shenanigans), and just fly/repair the planes; (2) To reg the jets in Nigeria, and earn NCAA et al more funds, and provide perhaps more participation for local regulatory people/bodies; (3) To get together to build maint facilities in Nigeria, like telecoms/oil magnate Mike Adenuga is doing with his Lagos hangar. There's space for his GLEX and Challenger 604, as well as business mogul Aliko Dangote's GLEX XRS.
Clearly, there won't be any benefit in griping; I have done that over the years, to no avail. Just how powerful these jet owners are is evident in their near total reliance on foreign crews to the exclusion of locals, whereas many suitably qualified locals are out of work or dis-satisfied with their lot. One would have thought NCAA or Ministry of Labour or Immigration would intervene, if not initiate actions without been prompted. But no, not in Nigeria. That doesn't happen here.
So, in the final analysis, it's almost like "if you can't beat them, join them".
What is as certain as the sun setting tonight and rising tomorrow is that any local interests who clash in with these tycoons in the court of Goodluck Jonathan would get a severe beating, and find themselves tossed in the streets after the humiliation. Sad, but true.
(1) To employ local pilots and techs, who before-hand should be urged to shut up(with regard to any employers' shenanigans), and just fly/repair the planes; (2) To reg the jets in Nigeria, and earn NCAA et al more funds, and provide perhaps more participation for local regulatory people/bodies; (3) To get together to build maint facilities in Nigeria, like telecoms/oil magnate Mike Adenuga is doing with his Lagos hangar. There's space for his GLEX and Challenger 604, as well as business mogul Aliko Dangote's GLEX XRS.
Clearly, there won't be any benefit in griping; I have done that over the years, to no avail. Just how powerful these jet owners are is evident in their near total reliance on foreign crews to the exclusion of locals, whereas many suitably qualified locals are out of work or dis-satisfied with their lot. One would have thought NCAA or Ministry of Labour or Immigration would intervene, if not initiate actions without been prompted. But no, not in Nigeria. That doesn't happen here.
So, in the final analysis, it's almost like "if you can't beat them, join them".
What is as certain as the sun setting tonight and rising tomorrow is that any local interests who clash in with these tycoons in the court of Goodluck Jonathan would get a severe beating, and find themselves tossed in the streets after the humiliation. Sad, but true.
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Check that number!
You wrote '$100 a day,' but I think you mean '$100 a year,' yes? That sounds about right to me, yup.
Oh, by all means, guys, get your trotters into that trough and try to find some Nigerian yahoo who will operate his new jet on that stolen money until his mind, one with the attention span of a fruit fly, switches to some other new toy, meanwhile sort of 'forgetting' to pay his pilots, engineers and maintenance organization for his shiny new toy. You can read pages and pages here about how well that has worked out down the years. Still, if it's the only game in town....
Oh, by all means, guys, get your trotters into that trough and try to find some Nigerian yahoo who will operate his new jet on that stolen money until his mind, one with the attention span of a fruit fly, switches to some other new toy, meanwhile sort of 'forgetting' to pay his pilots, engineers and maintenance organization for his shiny new toy. You can read pages and pages here about how well that has worked out down the years. Still, if it's the only game in town....
