?Newly acquired jet flown to South Africa for refitting and repainting

At least N20.03bn was spent on the maintenance and operations of the Presidential Air Fleet from July 2023 to December 2024.

This was as the new presidential jet purchased last year has been flown to South Africa for refurbishment and upgrades.

Findings by our correspondents from GovSpend, a civic tech platform that tracks and analyses the Federal Government?s spending, revealed that for 2024, the payouts amounted to N14.15bn, representing 71 per cent of the allocations for the fleet in the 2024 fiscal year.

Most disbursements were labelled ?Forex Transit Funds,? usually funds allocated for foreign exchange requirements to facilitate international transactions and engagements.

For the Presidential Air Fleet, such funds cover expenses related to operations abroad, including fuel purchases, maintenance or services in foreign currencies.

?When aircraft on the fleet are abroad, payments are often made in U.S. dollars or another foreign currency to ensure we have uninterrupted operations,? a government official explained.

In July 2023, N1.52bn was disbursed in two tranches of N846m and N675m for ?Presidential air fleet forex transit funds.?

The following month, N3.1bn was disbursed in three tranches of N388m, N2bn, and N713m for the same item. In November of that year, N1.26bn was released to the Presidential Air Fleet naira transit account.

The first overhead for 2024 was in March, when N1.27bn was disbursed twice, amounting to N2.54bn. The transit account received N6.35bn in April, N4.97bn in May and N210m in July.

In August, N5.60bn was released in six separate disbursements, the highest frequency that year. The monies were paid into the Presidential Air Fleet naira transit account, including a N168m transfer made on September 11 and 19. From December 7 to 24, 2025, N469.72m was released in eight tranches.

In April, the transit account received N5.08bn; this came around the same time the President was on a two-nation tour to the Netherlands and Saudi Arabia.

Although Tinubu arrived in the Netherlands in a state-owned Gulfstream AeroSpace 550 Jet, the aircraft could not proceed to Saudi Arabia due to unspecified technical problems. He reportedly continued his journey on a chartered private plane.

At the time, the President?s Boeing 737 business jet was undergoing maintenance. It was later replaced with an Airbus A330 purchased for $100m in August through the service-wide votes.

The nearly 15-year-old plane, an ACJ330-200, VP-CAC (MSN 1053), is ?spacious and furnished with state-of-the-art avionics, customised interior and communications system,? Tinubu?s Special Adviser on Information and Strategy, Mr Bayo Onanuga, said, adding ?it will save Nigeria huge maintenance and fuel costs, running into millions of dollars yearly.?

However, The PUNCH observes that since February 2025, the President has been using a San Marino-registered BBJ (REG: T7-NAS).

Sources who spoke to one of our correspondents confirmed that the primary aircraft had been flown to South Africa to change its livery to reflect the office of the President.

?The last I heard is that they took it abroad, I think to South Africa, to change the body design. You know it doesn?t have the green white green,? one source said, asking to remain anonymous.

?It?s not only the body paint. I learned they are doing some refurbishment on it,? a second official stated.

The new Airbus A330 is just one of several aircraft currently on the Presidential Air Fleet, arguably one of Africa?s largest, with around 11 aircraft of various makes and models.

Until August, it comprised the 19-year-old B737-700 (BBJ) and a 13-year-old Gulfstream Aerospace G550. The BBJ was acquired during the tenure of former President Olusegun Obasanjo at $43m, but became a money guzzler as it aged.

The presidential fixed-wing fleet includes a Gulfstream G500, two Falcon 7Xs, a Hawker 4000, and a Challenger 605. Three of the seven fixed wings are reportedly unserviceable.

The rotor-wing fleet includes two Agusta 139s and two Agusta 101s, all operated by the Nigerian Air Force but supervised by the Office of the National Security Adviser.

Since 2017, budgetary allocations for the PAF have shown a growing trend, with one exception in 2020. The allocation for the fleet increased from N4.37bn in 2017 to N20.52bn in 2024, showing a 370 per cent rise in running costs. In 2022, maintenance expenses for each aircraft ranged from $1.5m to $4.5m annually.

In 2018, the fleet?s budget rose significantly by 66.13 per cent to N7.26bn, driven by a substantial increase in capital project allocations while maintaining similar levels for recurrent costs. This upward trajectory continued into 2019, slightly increasing the total allocation to N7.30bn.

The exception came in 2020, when the budget dropped by nearly 7 per cent to N6.79bn, primarily due to decreased overhead costs, a reflection of the global economic impacts of lockdowns and disruptions in operations.

By 2021, however, the budget surged dramatically to N12.55bn?a record increase of 84.83 per cent from the previous year. The 2022, 2023 and 2024 appropriation acts earmarked N12.48bn, N13.07bn and N20.52bn respectively.

On his way to the 2024 Commonwealth Heads of Government Summit in Samoa, a foreign object damaged the cockpit windscreen of Vice President Kashim Shettima?s Gulf Stream aircraft during a stopover at JFK Airport in New York.

According to Lee Aerospace, manufacturers of Gulfstream jet windshields, these thick, multilayered structures comprise varying layers of glass and transparent acrylic, built to withstand collisions with a 2 kg object.

However, damage to the windshield must have affected its inner layers. While specific prices for replacement can vary based on supplier, labour rates and regional costs, estimates suggest that a single windshield replacement for a G550 can range from $50,000 to $70,000 for part and labour costs.

In an interview with our correspondent, the General Secretary of the Aviation Round Table, Olumide Ohunayo, blamed the meteoric rise in the allocations for the PAF on the age of some of the fleet?s aircraft, the declining value of the naira, and the Nigerian Air Force?s ?commercial use? of aircraft.

Ohunayo explained, ?The cost will definitely increase over the years because, for one, this issue of the naira against the dollar. As the naira keeps falling to the dollar, we will see a rise in cost because most of the costs of training crew and engineers and replacing aircraft parts are all in dollars.

?Also, some of these aircraft are not new. The older the aircraft, the higher the cost of maintenance and operation. Lastly, during these past years, terrorism and insecurity have increased in Nigeria, which has also affected the cost of insuring the aircraft.?

The Executive Chairman of the Centre for Anti-Corruption and Open Leadership, Debo Adeniran, argued that the administration?s spending habits were contrary to Nigerians? expectations of frugality.

?What we are getting from this administration is the opposite of our expectations. We thought we would have an administration that would be frugal in spending and very meticulous at implementing its budget. But what we are getting is an administration that has fallen in love with profligacy, that doesn?t see anything wrong in living big in a poverty-stricken nation.

Adeniran further said, ?It is a reenactment of the Shagari administration, whereby they bought the biggest Mercedes Benz and made themselves as comfortable as possible without considering how much the masses are suffering.

?So when you look at a Vice President saying he?s not travelling [to Samoa] again because there was a splinter on the windscreen of his private aircraft. Why should that be the case?

?First and foremost, we need to be represented at such an international meeting, where we should be well represented by the first two citizens of this country. He abandoned that, which means we would have lost certain representation that we deserve at that forum. Two, money will have been spent on advance parties that went ahead of the Vice President. But he abandoned the journey altogether.?

The CEO of Centurion Security Limited, John Ojikutu, justified the figure considering all related expenses.

?That?s not a big deal. If they are going to go and repair, particularly for C-checks, it?s always around that range. They will fly it abroad, but fuel, catering, and hotel bills are also involved; pilots will fly it back, and the figure likely includes far more than the direct cost of repairing the aircraft,? Ojikutu explained.

Meanwhile, the President?s Special Adviser on Information and Strategy, Mr. Bayo Onanuga, argued that the new Airbus 330 aircraft and the costs of maintaining the air fleet are not for the President?s comfort but in the interest of Nigerians.

?It?s not President Tinubu?s plane; it belongs to the people of Nigeria, it is our property?the President did not buy a new jet; what he has is a refurbished jet ? it has been used by somebody else before he got it, but it is a much newer model than the one President Buhari used.

?The one President Buhari used was bought by President Obasanjo some 20 years ago. There was a time when the President went to Saudi Arabia, and the plane developed some problems. The President had to leave the Netherlands with a chartered jet.

?Nigerians should try to prioritise the safety of the President. I?m not sure anybody wishes our President to go and crash in the air. We want his safety so that he can hand it over to whoever wants to take over from him,? Onanuga said. (The PUNCH, excluding headline)

Update news