Aviation experts have expressed divergent views over the federal government’s decision to put on sale its two-decade-old Boeing 737‑700 Business Jet (BBJ) purchased by the administration of President Olusegun Obasanjo.
LEADERSHIP reports that the decision to sell the aircraft followed the acquisition of Airbus A330 for the use of President Bola Tinubu. The A330 was acquired last year for $100m (over N150bn).
The old presidential aircraft is said to be undergoing inspections at AMAC Aerospace, Basel, according to public listings on Controller, a global aircraft sales platform.
The Presidency source said that with over 19 years in service, the BBJ has become increasingly expensive to maintain and subject to safety scrutiny, particularly after a mechanical incident during an official trip to Saudi Arabia in April 2024.
But, aviation experts have disagreed over the sale of the aircraft as some described it as uneconomical, thereby criticising Boeing’s safety records in recent years.
Others believed that the maintenance team of the aircraft mismanaged the aircraft and was one of the reasons for the sale.
Speaking exclusively to LEADERSHIP, aviation security expert, Capt. John Ojikutu (rtd), said countries and airlines are dropping Boeing over safety and cost of maintenance.
According to him, airlines, even foreign carriers, are dropping Boeing for Embraer, which is less expensive to maintain and safer.
“I am in support of the Federal government. Airlines are changing. I mean, a lot of airlines are buying Embraer now. Not many of them are talking about Boeing. The same thing with foreign airlines that are flying here now.
“At the end of the day, we may not be able to have support engineering facilities to maintain it. So, let nobody raise any problem about that. They are bound to change into Airbus. There shouldn’t be any problem with that.”
“The only problem that is there now is going to be about cost because when people drop Boeing, it will affect the maintenance cost. Where are you going to cover the maintenance costs? Are there people at Boeing still who are going to do maintenance? As the airlines are changing to Airbus, the technical people, too, are changing to Airbus.”
Capt. Ojikutu, who is a one-time Commandant, Murtala Muhammed Airport, Lagos, queried why Boeing is replacing its engine with Rolls-Royce and McDonald.
“I read something about Boeing buying a McDonald’s engine or even a Rolls-Royce engine from Europe. And it didn’t work with the framework of their airline. They have made engines before but why don’t they continue with their own engines? What is the business that you are going to gain from going to Britain to buy McDonald’s and Rolls-Royce? Have you tested those engines with the framework of the aircraft? So, the engineers in America around that time were complaining about these engines. You understand? So, the only thing is that they didn’t mention the engine name. It’s only now that I’m hearing the engine name.
I say, you drop your Boeing engine, you are buying a Rolls-Royce engine. You are buying a McDonald’s engine. McDonald’s was one they used for the DC aircraft and all these DC aircraft were built at the top. But, whatever happened, they are not manufacturing the engine. Americans are not making the engine. They are buying a British engine. Well, I won’t criticise it for safety reasons,” he stated.
Speaking on safety, Capt. Ojikutu said, “There have been so many safety reports about Boeing compared with Airbus, all these are Boeing 737-800 MAX. Boeing 737-800 MAX and, like I told you, even their own engineers in America are complaining. They have been complaining about the engine.”
“There have been so many accidents, more than the Airbus in the last 7 years especially the MAX aircraft and the 800 type. There have been so many of them,” he stated.
Also speaking, the general secretary of the Aviation Round Table Initiative (ARTI), Olumide Ohunayo, said the aircraft was a little too early to have all the issues that were associated with it.
He also warned that the government must ensure that there is no repeat of what happened to the Boeing 737 business jet with the new Airbus aircraft bought by the President.
Ohunayo queried the maintenance team of the aircraft, saying the team along the line managed the aircraft.
“The aircraft is 20 years old, but then, we don’t use the year alone to judge an aircraft’s performance. The airline did just 4,000 hours of flying time and 1,800 landings. It’s not a schedule. It was a private jet for the presidency. So, it was not flying daily or had a large number of rotations, but I feel what happened was that there was something wrong. Somebody dropped the ball in the maintenance of that aircraft.”
“And in that, in dropping the ball, we found out that the aircraft itself began to perform in the least effective mode. You can imagine that an aircraft that was put for sale only last year, money was spent to retrofit the interior of the aircraft. So what has changed now? If you did not believe in the aircraft, you wouldn’t have gone ahead to fix the interior and upgrade it, and wouldn’t have put it on the market the next year.”
According to Ohunayo, the aircraft would be quickly bought off the shelf by new clients, managed and put back into use.
“For me, the problem was not the aircraft, but the maintenance team of that aircraft, who somewhere along the line dropped the ball, could not go along, could not monitor or did not do the appropriate thing in the maintenance of the aircraft’s engines and other electricals that was giving that aircraft issue.
“Now, the same aircraft has been put for sale in Switzerland. You would be surprised at how quickly that aircraft would be taken by new clients, managed and put back into use.
“We are going ahead to buy another aircraft, a bigger aircraft. I don’t see how we tend to reduce costs by buying a bigger A330 compared to the 737 we are trying to discard. But if we do not put in a perfect maintenance regime and team in place, we might end up having the same problem that they’ve had with the 737.
“I think that aircraft was a little too early to have all the issues that were associated with it. But then, as we put in the market a new one that we bought, we must ensure that we do not have a repeat of what happened to the 737 business jet with the new aircraft bought by the President,” Ohunayo stated.
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