By Kay Lord
It’s a common feeling among citizens never to trust the government regarding any budget earmarked for infrastructural development around the country.
I am one person who always believes they must have padded it and possibly loaded it up to settle some politicians. We are all guilty of that distrust of government expenditure because, oftentimes, it can be opaque.
When the news about the “renovation” of the Murtala Mohammed International Airport, Lagos filtered in, along with the budget released by the Department of Public Procurement, a lot of people started complaining about how such a huge amount of ₦712 billion could be spent on mere renovation.
But after the Minister for Aviation, Festus Keyamo, said it’s not a renovation but a total rebuild of the terminal, I was still a little bit sceptical about the figure. Since I am not an illiterate, I knew there are other airports around Africa that have witnessed either a renovation, extension, or a total rebuild.
International airports around the world—and especially the new ones in some African nations—all have similar features that can be used to benchmark whether what Nigeria budgeted as the cost for the MMIA is justified or not. So, I went on to do some research, and my findings are below:
Kotoka International Airport, Accra, Ghana (Extension / Terminal 3) Terminal 3, officially inaugurated in October 2018, was built under a US $274 million contract-(N548 billion Naira)
Dr. António Agostinho Neto International Airport, Angola
The new Luanda airport—also known as Antonio Agostinho Neto International—was built at a cost broadly reported between US $3 billion and US $3.8 billion.
(N7.7 Trillion Naira)
Ethiopia – New Mega‑Airport (Bishoftu/Abusera International Airport)
The first phase is expected to cost at least US $6 billion, per Ethiopian Airlines CEO remarks .
A broader agreement signed with the African Development Bank places the total project value at US $7.8 billion .
(15.6 Trillion Naira)
Rwanda – New Bugesera International Airport (near Kigali)
Originally estimated at US $1.3 billion, but cost projections have since risen to approximately US $2 billion by project completion around 2028. (N4 Trillion Naira)
Rebuilding of Murtala Mohammed International Airport, Lagos.
₦712.2 billion = $356.1 million
You can now make of it what you want to based on the structure of the new MMIA in the attached video.
Selah!
*Culled from Kay Lord’s page on Facebook
