By Shola Adekola | Lagos
The desires of young people to realise their dreams of becoming pilots, aircraft engineers and other related aviation professionals through aviation training institutes in Nigeria may soon be a tall dream following the increment of tuition fees by the management of the Nigerian College of Aviation Technology (NCAT), Zaria.
The college recently raised the tuition fees for the student pilots from N7 million to N13 million for the two-year period of the training.
Information gathered by Nigerian Tribune indicated the increase in the students pilot training was backed by the National Assembly on the premise that the Kwara State owned aviation college in Ilorin was already charging a higher fee of N14 million.
The tuition fees increase has however started generating reactions with key players arguing that the high increase by the management of the Federal Government owned school will deny many students from average homes the opportunity of fulfilling their career dreams.
In his reaction, the Director at Zenith Travels in Lagos, Olumide Ohunayo, said the fee increment could discourage prospective students from applying to the college which could jeopardise future generations of aviation professionals in the country.
He however, appealed to NCAT management to review the increase on the basis that since the school, as a federal government entity, enjoys budgetary allocation from the government, there was no excuse for them to collect the same fees as state-owned institutions.
Rather than increase fees, Ohunayo said, the college should have subsidised fees for Nigerian students in the college as a way of giving back part of the public funds being used to run the college.
He said, “Even at N7 million, most of the students were sponsored by the government and now that it is N14 million, who is going to go there. They want the instructors to be on holiday.”
