Former Governor of Anambra State, Mr. Peter Obi, has expressed shock over the sudden suspension of plans by the Federal Government to float a new national carrier to be known as Nigeria Air. Minister of State for Aviation, Senator Hadi Sirika, who unveiled the airline with fanfare on July 16 at the Farnborough International Air Show in the United Kingdom, announced the suspension of the project via Twitter on Wednesday afternoon. He said the decision was taken by the Federal Executive Council and gave no reasons.

Reacting to the development, Obi told newsmen who sought his reaction to the development on Friday: “One is really worried about the way things are going and how we are ridiculing ourselves globally at a time we are supposed to be taken serious as a developing country.

“How can anybody justify the fact that a Federal Government Minister went to faraway Farnborough International Air Show, where the whole world gathered, to announce and unveil Nigeria Air with a firm date that it would take off by December 2018 – giving an impression that everything as already finalised – and thereafter started looking for partners and investors, and now for the federal Government to suspend the entire exercise!”

A perplexed Obi asked: “Does it mean that they that they never discussed it at the Federal Executive Council before the Minister went to England to unveil it?”

The former Governor lamented that, with the unexpected turn of events regarding Nigeria Air, “No well-meaning investor or country will take us serious again.”

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