The Ogun State gubernatorial candidate of the New Nigeria People’s Party (NNPP) in the last general elections, Ambassador Olufemi Ajadi, has attributed various challenges encountered by the passengers during flights to the poor maintenance capacity of aircrafts operating at Nigeria airports.
Describing the situation as a primitive system that needs urgent attention from various relevant government authorities.
Ambassador Ajadi, hence, calling on the Nigeria Civil Aviation Authority (NCAA) and other relevant government agencies to be more up and doing in the area of policy formation, implementation and execution such as mandating airlines operation with standard and better aircrafts.
He also called for stringent sanction against any airline that fail to airlift passengers on scheduled time, as well as other violation of local content policy of the country, where some airlines are still selling tickets in dollars instead of Nigerian currency, Naira.
It could be recalled that recently Ajadi threatened to sue Dana Airline for N50 million damages over failure to provide a scheduled plane to airlift him and other passengers from Abuja to Lagos resulting into lossing of contract worth millions of naira.
Also just yesterday, Sunday, it was gathered that there was an emergency landing involving Max Air aircraft after the tyre of the aircraft burst after takeoff at Yola Airport, however, made an emergency landing in Abuja, which resulted into temporarily shutting down of runway for the evacuation of the aircraft.
Ajadi in a statement on Monday said his recent experiences in boarding aircraft within the country was not palatable and nothing to write about.
He maintained that most of the airlines are operating with old and obsolete aeroplanes that are unfit, stressing that the airline industry, especially those running local businesses, should be monitored and sanctioned if necessary by the relevant federal government agencies like NCAA.
Ogun NNPP guber candidate noted that nonchalant attitude of government towards some areas of human endeavours and economic growth and development are major factor responsible for negligence of most of the airline companies.
According to him, “If government wake up to its responsibility in sanction most of these erring airline operators, they will think twice and wake up to the responsibility.
“But our government did not take us serious, I have called their attention twice to our plight in aviation sector but nothing good comes from their part, this is the third time calling their attention to the suffering of Nigerians in aviation sector”.
Reeling out his sordid experience in the sector, Ajadi said, “the airline, in which I have been boarding in the recent times were turning all the boarding passengers into prayer-warriors as the aeroplane were jerking in a worrisome manner.
“Apart from the usage of old and obsolete aircrafts by most of the airline companies, the environment of the departure and arrival are not too conducive at all. Just recently on my way from Abuja to Lagos, the airline, Dana that supposed to board us by 9pm on Friday was not available until Saturday morning.
“We are just left stranded, no accommodation, no foods, we are just hanging around here, everywhere was hot and this act made me lose millions of naira worth of contract.
“I am calling on relevant government agencies particularly Nigeria Civil Aviation Authority (NCAA) to take urgent steps in saving Nigerians from this avoidable acts by various airlines in the country”.
