Ahead of concessioning, ISO begins audit of all four viable Int’l airports
At a time the federal government remains entangled with several opinion leaders and staff of federal agencies working in the aviation sector over the planned sale of all four most viable and busy international airports, the International Standards Organisation (ISO) has commenced audit of the four facilities in Lagos, Port Harcourt, Kano and Abuja.
Though government was silent on whether the checks are part of conditions for the concession before year end, the Nigerian Meteorological Agency (NiMet), revealed that the ISO will also embark on the first maintenance audit of NiMet in order to ensure that it is sustaining the standard stipulated in the ISO 9001: 2015 certification, which the agency migrated to one year ago.
Giving insights on the imports of the audit exercise, the ISO’s External Auditor in charge of the exercise, Frank Stromhier, observed that apart from the fact that it was a requirement within the ISO “Once an organisation was registered and certified, it would require an audit at least once a year to ensure that it was following the established registration requirements”.
“The scope of the audit would include the agency’s infrastructure, human resources, environment and instruments and involve inspecting the four international airports in Abuja, Kano, Port Harcourt and Lagos as covered in the scope of the NiMet certification.
Business Hilights gathered that the maintenance audit would be for two years.
Industry analysts say the ISO 9001:2015 certification is a standard ICAO requirement that has brought international visibility to NiMet, being the first African meteorological institution to acquire it, and has also enhanced the agency’s operational activities and drawn commendations from both domestic and foreign airlines.
The Chief Executive Officer of NiMet, Prof. Sani Mashi, who spoke on the imports of the audit, stressed that “NiMet is still the only meteorological institution in Africa that is so certified”.
