THE CAPE TOWN CONVENTION AND ITS IMPLEMENTATION IN NIGERIAN AIR LAW

Abstract

The Cape Town Convention (CTC) was an international attempt aimed at addressing the
challenges that faced aircraft secured credit transaction. Nigeria became a signatory to the CTC over two
decades ago but was yet to optimally benefit from its implementation. Only recently, the Government
through the Ministry of Aerospace Development got the Federal High Court to issue a practice direction
that gave judicial notice to the CTC in Nigeria. This paper found that even though the Cape Town
Convention had addressed the internationality of the challenges of aircraft financing and protection of
security interest, there were still challenges from jurisdiction to jurisdiction. One noticeable challenge is
the fragmentation and friction of legal and institutional frameworks in signatory states viz-a-viz the
implementation of the CTC. There is also the challenge of fidelity to the application of local legislation
over the international template created by the CTC. While jurisdictions like Australia have a very robust
judicial precedent on the issues of secured credit in mobile asset, Nigeria’s is still nascent. It is
recommended that the regulatory regime for aircraft financing and security interest be synchronized to the
gold standard level required for a seamless operation of the CTC to enable optimum benefit from the CTC.