Keyamo, Gov Oborevwori & The Imperative For Upgrade Of The Osubi Airstrip

It is pathetic that despite my many appeals to Minister Festus Keyamo and Governor Sherriff Oborevwori to join hands to expand the Osubi Airstrip Runway to a standard Airport, the appeals have fallen to deaf ears.

The facility built by Shell gave room for expansion of the runway/tarmac to accommodate bigger aircrafts to land and take off since the land for expansion is available to expand Osubi airstrip to international airport.

Few days ago, Maiduguri Airport was opened for international flights and President Bola Tinubu and Keyamo were praised. Not too long Minister Keyamo was given award as best performing Minister of Aviation and Aerospace Development.

The Osubi runway/tarmac upgrade is overdue. Keyamo few days after his appointment as minister of Aviation announced to the world that Tinubu has approved N2Billion for the expansion of Osubi Runway but surprisingly up till now no expansion project in the runway/tarmac.

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It is painful that Osubi Airstrip sits by his native home of Uvwie LGA where he has a country home in Effurun GRA and Gov Oborevwori is a native of Osubi town where the facility is cited in Okpe LGA and he resides there.

Though now staying in Asaba from assuming Speaker of Delta House of Assembly and now governor, his permanent home remains Osubi in Okpe LGA. Am compelled to remind Keyamo and Oborevwori again to both expand the Osubi Airstrip Runway.

Once again I want to highlight the reflection by Alhaji Abdullah Bukar who was Shell General Manager Surface Engineering on his Christmas & New Year message to me regarding my concern over the Osubi airstrip upgrade.

Bukar noted, “My brother Zik.
Merry Xmas and Happy New Year.
May the Almighty grant us all the blessings of this time and shield us from the iniquities. When the project team designed and built Osubi, it anticipated possible future expansion options.

1. Nigerian aviation laws do not allow private airports like Osubi to exceed certain dimensions. They must be l1.8km long or shorter, and also 30 metres wide or thinner.

2. Osubi design respected the above, but in building it, we actually prepared for easy eventual extension to the minimum International Civil Aviation Organisation (ICAO) dimensions of 2.5km long and 45 metres wide. This can easily be seen by the way we installed runway lights and the approaches.

3. If simple extension is not to be considered to avoid total shutdown, we allowed space for a second runway, parallel to the existing one, and space a new aprons and terminal and other services facilities on the other side, in a mirror image of the current setup.

4. All the Minister of Aviation needs to do is call in Julius Berger and entice them to be part of the redevelopment.”

Once again I appeal to Minister Keyamo and Gov Oborevwori to join hands to do the needful to expand the Osubi runway/tarnac as advised by Engr Abdullah Bukar who is a Warri home boy that spent all his young and adult life working in Shell Petroleum Development Company of Nigeria Ltd in Warri,Delta state where he gave birth to his children and raised them up.

Minister Keyamo and Gov Oborevwori, the ball is in your court. History will judge both of you if you fail to expand the Osubi Airstrip runway to a standard airport.

Zik Gbemre
January 6,2025

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