THE Management of Nigerian Airspace Management Agency (NAMA) has said there is no comparison between the Total Radar Coverage of Nigeria(TRACON) project and that of Namibia either in costs, capability and coverage.

NAMA made this declaration while reacting to news making the rounds that the cost of the Nigeria’s TRACON project was 500 per cent more compared with what Namibia spent to install its own.

According to the management of NAMA,  the TRACON project delivered co-located PSR-MSSR, Air Traffic Management System including Simulator,VCCS, VRS, MF- TDMA VSAT network, fibre optics, generators, AVRs, UPS and civil works at 9 sites for 67 million euros.

“New technologies like ADS-B, ADS-C and MLAT are all complementary and not meant to replace the radar. Though they are cheaper at deployment but the aircraft need to have enhanced equipment page in terms of transponders and other compatible avionics.

’’It is quite absurd and preposterous comparing what the TRACON project delivered with a project on ADS-C. It's like comparing an apple with orange.

“You only compare cost of similar projects and not dissimilar ones. If we chose to implement ADS-B, it will just serve as an overlay on the TRACON as the Eurocat Air Traffic Management System is not only ADS-B compatible, we also have the servers (ADS-B) already installed as AGDPs in Lagos, Kano, Abuja and Port Harcourt.

‘’Nigeria is on the right path as far as airspace infrastructure is concerned. We just need to sustain the tempo, stay focused and we will get there’’, a statement from NAMA said.  

It will be recalled that a United Kingdom based Nigerian aviation expert, Captain Dung Pam, on Sunday disclosed that the Nigeria’s €65m Total Radar Coverage of Nigeria (TRACON) project was at least 500 per cent costlier than that of Namibia which was completed with just $14m.

According to Pam, Nigeria and Namibia completed total radar coverage of their airspaces in 2011.

Pam, who is also the President of the Nigerian Aviation Safety Initiative (NASI), an industry pressure group, stressed that authorities must be held accountable for their actions and decisions if Nigeria hoped to achieve a considerable level of safety in the aviation sector.

The industry expert told journalists in a news conference that it was illogical for Nigeria, which has almost the same land area with Namibia, to spend €65m to put its approximately 923000 square kilometres land area on the radar while Namibia spent just $14m to accomplish same feat on its 825,000 square kilometres land area.

The pilot said the situation became worrisome for the fact that the project was done for the two countries by the same French company, Thales of France.