Before the European Commission updated the EU Air Safety List, where the all airlines certified in Indonesia are cleared from the list (June 14), the Director General of Civil Aviation of the Indonesian Republic, Dr. Agus Santoso received “Council President Certificate (CPC)” awarded directly by the President of International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) Council, Dr. Olumuyiwa Benard Aliu at the ICAO headquarter in Montreal, Canada (May 17, 2018).

The President of ICAO Council said that the award of CPC is a form of ICAO recognition over the achievement and improvement of the Indonesian Republic government in solving some safety oversight deficiencies and strong commitment of the government to continually increase the Effective Implementation (EI) number of ICAO’s Standards and Recommended Practices (SARPs) in aviation safety. 

“The achievement and improvement of the Government of Indonesian Republic in aviation safety is a success output in developing work synergies with regulators-operators. And the supports from all parties due to the President Joko Widodo’s motivations and referrals as well as the trusts from the Minister of Transportation Budi Karya Sumadi and his ranks in the Directorate General of Civil Aviation and the related stakeholders of the Indonesian aviation transportation,” said Agus Santoso.

Some improvements on safety flight by the Indonesian Government are: 

- issuing regulations in association with safety flight that meet the current ICAO’s Standard, 

- reinforcing duties and organization functions of the Directorate General of Civil Aviation,

- developing capabilities and flight safety inspectors’ qualifications,                           

- and strengthening the control systems over ICAO’s standard and recommended practices implementation in flight safety on all operators (airlines, airport operators, flight navigation operators, and airplane industries).

As it is known, on February 28, 2018, ICAO officially issued its on-site audit report conducted in Indonesia in October 2017 where Indonesia succeeded to achieve the EI numbers for 80.34 per cent, increased significantly from the ICAO’s audit result in 2014 that was only 45.33 per cent.  

Therefore, the result of aviation safety audit has successfully brought Indonesia to be at the 58th world rank of 192 countries of ICAO’s members or jumped to the 10th Asia-Pacific rank of 39 countries that are included in ICAO’s Regional Office’ accreditation in Bangkok. 

According to Agus, this award could increase the international world’s trusts more to the Indonesian aviation so as to be able to support the national economy improvement. 

As the consequences of this award, Agus asked all stakeholders in aviation to improve their work further in safety and security sectors of aviation so that the Indonesian EI points could be maintained and improved.