President Bola Tinubu on Monday, traveled to Paris, France inside the new Airbus A330, one of the jets recently seized by Zhongshan Fucheng Industrial Investment Co, a Chinese firm.
The Presidential jet was earlier released by the Chinese firm, Zhongshan Fucheng Industrial Investment Co, on Friday to enable the President use it to France
Ajuri Ngelale, Special Adviser to the President on Media and Publicity, has in a statement on Sunday night, said the President will be traveling to France, even though the purpose of the trip was not made public.
It was gathered that the jet landed at the Nnamdi Azikiwe International airport on Sunday
Tinubu’s jet departed the Nnamdi Azikiwe International Airport for France at about 3.30pm
Unlike previous trips, Presidency officials shelved regular ceremonies.
The jet was one of the three jets seized by Franch Court last Wednesday at the requests of the Chinese firm, over an alleged breach of contract by the Ogun State government.
The aircraft was received by officials of Nigeria’s Presidential Air Fleet, led by their commander, Olayinka Olusola, an air vice marshal. The Airbus 330 aircraft is a repossessed one recovered from an indebted oil sheikh who used the aeroplane as collateral for a loan he obtained from an unidentified German bank to buy it.
According to Premium Times, L & L International LLC, an American aviation firm based in Miami, Florida, brokered the deal, which saw Nigeria buy the aircraft for over $100 million. A presidency official described the acquisition as an excellent deal for Nigeria, putting the aircraft’s real market value in the region of $600 million.
The 5N-FGA Airbus 330-200 is 14 years, nine months old and the production site is Toulouse. The A330-200 aircraft with serial number 1043, which made its very flight on the 10th of September, 2009 October has seat configuration of F25 and engine type 2 x RR Trent 772B-60.
The Airbus A330 is a wide-body aircraft developed and produced by Airbus. Airbus began developing larger A300 derivatives in the mid-1970s, giving rise to the A330 twinjet as well as the A340 quadjet, and launched both designs along with their first orders in June 1987.
The A330-300, the first variant, took its maiden flight in November 1992 and entered service with Air Inter in January 1994.
The slightly shorter A330-200 variant followed in 1998 with Canada 3000 as the launch operator.
