Leadership (Abuja)
Kingsley Alu
30 August 2009
Abuja — Virgin Nigeria has finally ended its technical partnership with the mother airline, Virgin Atlantic Airways. The airline this weekend entered into a new Technical Service Agreement, TDS with Ethiopian Airlines to aid its operations.
The two airlines have emerged as the first African Airline to sign a Technical Service Agreement (TSA), covering training, maintenance and resource pooling.
The agreement was signed in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, with the managing director of Ethiopian Airline, Mr. Girma Wake and Capt. Dapo Olumide, chief executive officer, Virgin Nigeria Airways in attendance for the ratification of the deal.
Both leading top managements of both airlines paid glowing tribute to the possibility of collaboration among African business and commercial interests,while describing the TSA as the first effective action among African airlines representing West and East Africa bloc.
According to the Virgin boss, "the agreement is a Paradigm shift that changes the way Airlines function; It also shows an audacity for Nigerian airline to partner another African airline, which by the way is more profitable than all European airlines combined. This is completely unheard of in Africa."
He explained, "The maintenance of all our B737 aircrafts will be done with Ethiopian airlines, but there are a host of other opportunities, which include: training of our pilots, cabin crew, engineers. They have a vast and extensive network in training. This is one African airline that is actually bigger than most European companies".
He added that the new TSA was part of a broad strategy that would ultimately signal the Airline's first step towards rebranding in name and work culture.
"All along, airlines in Africa do their training in Europe or America; we are going to do our training here, because Africa has come of age. We have seen what is going on in South African Airways, Kenya Airways and Ethiopian airlines, and we believe this is the future and we are moving on in that direction. This is in addition to the fact that it will reduce our costs significantly as well as make us more efficient. I am proud, this is a significant milestone" he explained.
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