Air Peace has condemned the attacks on its staff by some passengers in Abuja, Lagos, Calabar and other parts of the country.
The
airline in a statement issued by its Corporate Communications Manager,
Mr Chris Iwarah on Friday, warned that it would no longer condone
members of the public endangering the lives of its workers.
It
regretted that security agents had failed to halt the trend of members
of the public invading airport facilities to attack airline workers.
“On
Thursday, the winglet of one of our aircraft, which was being towed
within the very limited space at the ramp of the Murtala Muhammed
Airport in Lagos to position for departure, had a partial contact with
the stabiliser of another of our aircraft.
“We subsequently declared the two aircraft unserviceable in line with our high safety standards.
“We
were, therefore, compelled to adjust our schedules to close the gaps
created by the two aircraft, which were scheduled to do 14 sectors.
“While
we were trying to salvage the situation, some unruly passengers took
the law into their own hands, preventing passengers from boarding and
making it impossible for our aircraft to fly,” it said.
According
to the statement, in Abuja, a former top government official, whose
flight returned to Abuja when it could not land in Enugu due to the
closure of the airport at 7pm, refused to disembark and incited others
to join him in doing so.
The airline said the aircraft was eventually detained overnight in Abuja.
It
said, “The action of the former federal lawmaker and other unruly
passengers in our different stations worsened the already difficult
schedule we were making effort to save.
“Some flights we were prepared to operate despite the challenge we were facing, were eventually cancelled. “While
we were making effort to resolve the challenge with the decision to
commence our operations very early on Friday, a truck operated by Skyway
Aviation Handling Company rammed into another of our aircraft at the
Benin Airport and the aircraft was again declared unserviceable.”
The
airline said that the aircraft involved in the Benin incident was
scheduled to do seven sectors, including the Abuja-Benin service.
It
said :” Given the development, we had no choice than to cancel our
Abuja-Benin service and asked those who were willing to reschedule for
Saturday to do so, while others should be immediately refunded.
“Some
passengers, who were to fly with us from Abuja to Benin, however, went
violent. They attacked our staff in Abuja and almost killed our duty
manager.
“It took the intervention of Air Force personnel, who
were reportedly called in by the airport authorities, to rescue our duty
manager from the mob.
“But that did not prevent the passengers
from destroying our facilities. The menacing passengers also prevented
others from boarding their own flights, thereby complicating the
situation.
“In Lagos, some other passengers attacked and almost
killed our station manager. Also in Calabar, unruly passengers had an
unchallenged day, preventing our aircraft from flying.”
The
airline said it was surprising all the attacks could take place at the
nation’s airports, a high security environment, without any challenge
from security agents.
“The situation has, therefore, left us with
no choice than to resort to our right of self-defence to prevent our
staff from being killed.
“We can no longer tolerate unruly
passengers maiming our staff simply because we have chosen to provide
service in a very challenging environment.
“Security agencies
must, therefore, rise to the occasion before our staff, who are also
people’s children and parents, are killed.
“This is the least the
government can do to prevent unpatriotic citizens from bringing the few
surviving airlines in the country down,” it said.
