Who syndicated Associated Airline’s insurance abroad for commission?

Beyond the continued clamour for local content development, the Insurance Act 2003 made it compulsory that all risk emanating from the country must be domiciled with local insurers until local capacity is exhausted. And the National Insurance Commission (NAICOM) must also give its approval before any of such risks can be transferred abroad by any local insurer or broker.

This position of the law has continued to raise concern among stakeholders since the recent crash of an Associated Airline plane conveying the corpse of late Olusegun Agagu to Ondo from Lagos two weeks ago where about 15 passengers on board lost their lives.

More so, there has been no official report or assurances of compensation from the insurance regulator, NAICOM, many days after the crash, leaving victims’ families in worries.

Instead, assurances were coming from NCAA who is not the insurance regulator, and also reports has been that risk investigators from Lloyd’s market representing the Blake Group, a United Kingdom crisis management firm, were in the country to observe and inspect the circumstances surrounding the insurance policy of the crashed plane.

Under normal circumstances, the Nigerian Civil Aviation Authorities (NCAA) was suppose to carry the National Insurance Commission along in certifying the insurance of airlines as precondition for renewal of their licenses annually, to ensure safety and protection of air users.

Where this does not happen, then it means some powers were being compromised and this is why there has continued to be crises in the aviation insurance of airlines, making Nigeria’s air space more risky.

This therefore raises the question as to which local insurer syndicated the Associated Airline insurance offshore for commission without consideration for local capacity; was this done without NAICOM’s approval?; and under what condition did NCCA grant license to the airline without checking with insurance authorities, the validity of its insurance?

The implication is that someone, somewhere has broken the law and there should be punishment, and the sanction should serve as a lesson so that such a thing does not continue to occur; and by implication, safety and protection of people who use the air space can be better assured.

These unanswered questions, again, put the regulators under watch, demanding that they begin to assert their authority, and apply the provisions of the law by punishing those found culpable.

Doing this will go a long way to instil discipline, confidence and good ethical conduct in the industry as this is necessary to promote growth and development of the sectors.

It will be recalled that a plane belonging to the Associated Airlines crashed in Lagos on October 3, 2013, shortly after it took off in an attempt to convey Agagu’s body to Ondo state.

By: Modestus Anaesoronye