The Arewa Consultative Forum (ACF) has said any airline transacting business in Nigeria in foreign currency is an enemy of the country.
In a statement on Friday in Kaduna, Audu Ogbe, Chairman of the forum, said, “No airline wishing any country good should involve itself in sabotaging its economy through dwarfing the value of its currency.”
Ogbe, a former minister of agriculture the federal government for “the stern move on deterring any local or foreign airline that transacts business in Nigeria with foreign currency.”
He applauded pronouncements by Hadi Sirika, minister of aviation, who warned that any airline operator found selling flight tickets in foreign currency shall be sanctioned as such acts violate the laws.
Ogbe said transacting business in a foreign currency negates the value of the naira and will undoubtedly throw Nigeria and its economy in a precarious situation.
He said, “no airline will venture to perpetrate such ugly thing in most countries across the globe”.
He addded that, “any airline transacting a business in Nigeria in foreign currency is an enemy of the nation”.
He called on the aviation ministry to, as a matter of urgency, spread its tentacles in arresting such menace.
“No airline wishing any country good should involve itself in sabotaging its economy through dwarfing the value of its currency.
“Even in smaller African nations such callous economic investment was never allowed,” the ACF chairman said.
He called on the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), the Finance Ministry and President Muhammadu Buhari to adopt measures in ensuring that, “whoever arrives our country must convert his/her corrency into naira for whatever business transaction, failure of which amounts to economic sabotage”.
