According to Ogun State Governor Dapo Abiodun, The Agro-Cargo Airport project along the Ilisan-Iperu road in Ikenne Local Government Area of the state should be ready for commercial aviation operations by December.

According to a statement released on Monday, 23rd October 2023, by his Chief Press Secretary, Mr. Lekan Adeniran, Abiodun revealed this to reporters not long after surveying the work at the cargo airport.

The governor added that other multinational aviation firms are competing for concessionary operations; therefore, the state government will quickly recover all costs associated with this initiative.

He also said the facility’s concession would be completed in the following 1.5 months, with the state recovering its investment costs.

In the next 30 to 45 days, Abiodun predicted, “We should sign the dotted lines of the concession of this airport, which would mean that everything the airport has cost us would be completely repaid to us and we could use the money to pay our debt and also begin looking at other projects.”

“This airport would receive complete permission sometime in late November or early December. Here is where business operations would begin. By doing so, you may fly to Abuja from Port Harcourt, and by the grace of God, by the end of the year, you will start to see foreign flights take off from everywhere and arrive in this airport,” he added.

“We are developing a truly international airport, and we feel that the government should act as a facilitator for the enablers,” he continued. 

Even though we firmly think that the government has no place in the industry, we have de-risked this project because we recognize that if we waited for someone else to build the airport, we would likely still be waiting long after I must have left office.

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What did we do, though? To reduce project risk, the government opted to find money, construct the airport, and then grant concessions to others. As a result, the airport you see today is of a caliber that is grabbing the interest of airport operators worldwide.

We have a procedure in place, and a few other parties have shown interest in receiving the airport concession. It is quite thrilling that despite not being finished, people are vying to take over the airport, pay us back everything it has cost us, and start running it. No one would have visited if this airport hadn’t been constructed to a high standard worldwide. 

There are other airports created by various governments nationwide, and I have no idea how much interest international airport operators have in those airports. However, this airport has attracted the attention of those operators.

“You will see that our initiatives, vision, dedication, intentionality, and resolve are paying off,” the speaker said. “We refuse to be sidetracked by dishonest politicians and backstabbers, and we are determined to maintain our focus.”