NCAA to sanction Turkish Airlines

The Nigerian Civil Aviation Authority (NCAA) has said that it would not hesitate to invoke relevant sections of the organisation’s regulations to sanction Turkish Airlines for mistreatment of Nigerian passengers.

The NCAA's Director, Public Affairs and Consumer Protection, Mr. Michael Achimugu, disclosed this to newsmen on Wednesday in Lagos.

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

According to him, the Director-General of the NCAA, Capt. Chris Najomo, in a virtual meeting on Tuesday from the United Kingdom, initiated reconciliatorymoves 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 a 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, he 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 in the country.

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

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

He said: “The NCAA is currently investigating the circumstances surrounding the inability of Turkish Airlines to operate flights out of Lagos Airport due to the picketing of its operations by aviation unions.

“We will ensure that the rights of Nigerian passengers are not violated.

“President Bola Tinubu has directed the NCAA, FAAN, and relevant agencies to ensure that the rights of Nigerian passengers are protected.

“Currently, the NCAA is engaging officials of Turkish Airlines, but we have observed some degree of insolence from the country manager, who engaged our D-G in a shouting match; he was even banging the table.

“This behaviour towards the NCAA is unacceptable. At the end of our findings, if the airline is found culpable, we will invoke the relevant parts of our regulation, Part 17, to meet the right punishment,” he said.

On Wednesday evening, Achimugu visited the stranded passengers at the new terminal of the international airport, where he conveyed the message of the D-G to them, saying that 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 that 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 because of 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.”

Another passenger, a Germany-based construction worker, Charles Ifeanyi, also appealed to the Federal Government to intervene to save the situation, lamenting that the authorities must not allow Nigerians to be maltreated anywhere in the world anyhow.

Supreme News reports that the Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC) has begun the picketing of Turkish Airlines in Lagos.

The picketing is to ensure that the carrier reinstates staffers who were dismissed, forced to abandon duty, or forced to resign under duress, including those victimised for their union membership in 2020.