FG to sanction Turkish Airlines over failure to airlift Nigerians

The Federal Government says it would not hesitate to sanction Turkish Airlines over mistreatment of Nigerian passengers.

The Director of Public Affairs and Consumer Protection of the Nigerian Civil Aviation Authority (NCAA), Michael Achimugu, made this known in Abuja on Wednesday, May 22, 2024.

Achimugu said President Bola Tinubu had directed NCAA, the Federal Airports Authority of Nigeria (FAAN), and relevant agencies to ensure that the rights of Nigerian passengers are protected at all times.

He said the NCAA was currently mediating on the feud between the European carrier and aviation labour unions, who picketed the airline’s operations at the Murtala Muhammed International Airport, Lagos.

According to him, the agency will not hesitate to roll out stiff penalties and sanctions on Turkish Airlines as Nigerian passengers are still stranded at the airport, following its failure to airlift them to Istanbul.

Achimugu said the Federal Government and its agencies would spare no effort to call to order any airline that violates the rights of Nigerian passengers.

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He said the Director-General of NCAA, Capt. Chris Najomo, had in a virtual meeting on Tuesday from the United Kingdom initiated reconciliatory moves between the Country Manager of Turkish Airlines and the unions.

He, however, said the representative of the airline exhibited some traits of impudence, which the regulator deemed amounted to lack of regard for the system.

Arising from the infraction, Achimugu said the Federal Government would not hesitate to look deep into the impasse with the possibility of extracting the right punishment if the carrier is found culpable.

The Federal Government, the NCAA spokesman said, would take every step to ensure the rights of Nigerian passengers are not trampled on by any carrier, including foreign airlines, in taking the right steps to address any infractions on their conditions of operations into the country.

He confirmed that over 300 passengers had been trapped in the imbroglio involving the Turkish Airlines and aviation unions as the carrier had cancelled flights out of and into Nigeria until Thursday.

Achimugu said though the carrier claimed to have communicated with passengers through electronic mail on the ongoing hitch concerning its operations into and out of the country, some passengers still turned up at the Lagos airport.

Achimugu, on Wednesday evening, visited the stranded passengers at the new terminal of the international airport, where he conveyed the message of the NCAA DG to them, saying the authority would not rest until they were transported to their various destinations.

One of the stranded passengers, Obiekwe Ngozichukwu, a Guttenberg, Sweden resident, said he was afraid of losing his job as a top official of one of the hotels in the country because the company had been calling him to resume work.

He said he visited Nigeria for his mother’s burial but could not go back following the cancellation of his flight, and had been sleeping on the floor at the airport for two days.

“We don’t know when we are leaving here, I appeal to the authorities to intervene and save us from this experience,” Ngozichukwu said.

The Star