- Report highlights security lax in Lagos, Port Harcourt
- Officials demand bribes from us, say air travellers
For the second time, Nigerian airports have been rated among the worst in Africa.
A recent rating by a travel website, Guide to Sleeping in Airports, noted that the country’s airports could not compete favourably with their contemporaries in both developing and developed nations.
While the assessment rated South Africa’s Cape Town International Airport as the best in the continent, airports in countries like Rwanda, Mauritius and Algeria also topped the list.
In 2015, the same website, Guide to Sleeping in Airports, had put the Port Harcourt International Airport on its list of laggards, while assessing Africa’s airports.
These poor ratings were in spite of the fact that the Federal Government had in the last two years, spent over N40 billion and earmarked another N31 billion to renovate and upgrade major airports across the country.
Investigations by our correspondent, however, corroborated the ratings as it revealed the poor state of some of the facilities in many of the country’s airports.
According to findings, many of the airports and airlines are currently struggling with several problems, ranging from poor management and financial meltdown, to decreasing quality of services, unfriendly business environment and what some aviation workers described as “victimisation of employees.”
For instance, according a report of the Nigerian Civil Aviation Authority, the number of delayed flights skyrocketed from 2,000 as at the end of 2015 to over 4,000 by the end of 2016. Aircraft and cargo movement also dropped from 61,692 to 53,405; and 54.2 million to 47.3 million, respectively, within the period under review.
The Guide to Sleeping in Airports’ ratings particularly touched on “questionable and unpredictable security processes, lack of comfort, poor infrastructure, inefficient and corrupt staff,” among other deficiencies suffered by the Nigerian airports.
In the report, Port Harcourt airport was the second worst airport after South Sudan’s Juba Airport, while the Lagos Airport was the ninth worst in Africa.
Also, on the list of laggards were Douala International Airport, N’Djamena International Airport, Dar-es-Salaam’s Nyerere International Airport, Tanzania, and Lome-Tokoin Airport, Togo.
STAFF, AGENCIES ARE CORRUPT- PASSENGERS
The allegations of corruption levelled against some of airport staff and representatives of Federal Government’s parastatals stationed at the airports by the travel website were confirmed by some air passengers.
Also, contrary to the government’s anti-corruption crusade, some of the passengers that spoke with The Point in separate interviews, claimed that some workers with some Federal Government agencies, especially at international airports across the country, perpetrate ignoble acts.
Some of the agencies, whose officials had, on many occasions, been reported to be involved in some sharp practices, include the Nigeria Immigration Service, the National Drug Law Enforcement Agency, the Customs and the Police.
A Public Relations Consultant, Mrs. Funmilola Adeniji, alleged that some of the aviation workers demanded for bribes or tips as the case may be, from passengers at different points of either arrival or departure.
While embarking on a business trip to Dubai, United Arab Emirates, from the Murtala Muhammed International Airport, Lagos, in January 2017, she said she witnessed airport officials pestering passengers, demanding for money and other valuables, a scenario she described as “a disgrace to the nation.”
“Their demands were not limited to Nigerians but also extended to foreigners. At the checkpoint, some of them would not check the luggage at all once you had given them a tip, while some of us who refused to bribe them would be unnecessarily delayed,” she said.
Recounting her ordeal too, a cloth merchant, Ms. Chioma Fatukasi, said, “I was shocked after going past the first checkpoint at the Port Harcourt airport when I was confronted by another set of Police, NDLEA, Immigration and Customs officers, who had set up another ‘checkpoint’ to extort money from travellers.
“They were more forceful than the first set I met at the airport. The first set demanded for bribe humorously, but the second set wanted money from me and they wanted it fast. It was alarming when they demanded for foreign currencies because they found that I was travelling to Atlanta Georgia, United States.”
She further lamented that, “When I told them I don’t have dollars to part with, they demanded for valuables and I had to part with the wristwatch I bought for my son.”
There is a need to review the security apparatus at the airports. Most of them have perimeter fences that are not security-enhanced. There are also security threats; there is no central security control. Should anything happen, you cannot hold anybody responsible; everybody would pass the buck
OVERHAUL PERSONNEL, SECURITY SYSTEMS – EXPERTS
Reacting to the situation, stakeholders and industry observers have called for a total overhaul of key airport personnel and security systems in all Nigerian airports.
According to them, this is the solution to the various letdowns experienced by Nigeria through sanctions by international regulatory bodies, and poor ratings.
The menace, the experts said, could be stopped if the NCAA implemented thorough screening and checks for all workers at the airports.
Aviation security expert, Group Captain John Ojikutu (retd), called for the redesigning of the airport security architecture to improve security at the airports.
He said the current multiple checks at the airports indicated that no serious regulatory agency was actually in charge, adding that this could create security lapses.
He said, “Reduction and harmonisation of screening points by the various agencies as is the practice in the United States of America would improve security and reduce extortion.
“I hold NCAA responsible for security breaches. NCAA should review the security apparatus at the airports. Most of the airports in Nigeria have perimeter fences that are not security-enhanced. The perimeter fence at the Murtala Muhammed International Airport is used as part of a private residence.”
Ojikutu added, “There are security threats at all the airports. There is no central security control at the airports. Should anything happen, you cannot hold anybody responsible; everybody would pass the buck. The Federal Aviation Authority of Nigeria cannot be in charge of security because it was not established for that purpose.”
An industry observer based in Istanbul, Turkey, Mr. Tokunbo Aina, said, “The average air traveller out of our international airports goes through 15 checks. There is a dash table, that is, extortion table. They are a disgrace.
“The checks can be reduced to three efficient checkpoints. If there is no security, tourism will not thrive and our rating will drop every year. We need to focus on legislation. Some of the laws are outdated. They need to be updated. We also need to look at the training to be effective, as well as the equipment. We need to look at insider threats and intensify intelligence gathering.”
He urged the NCAA to embark on education and awareness on the threat, develop a plan, and compel other agencies to comply with it.
An Information Technology expert, Mr. Dare Oyeduntan, in his contribution, said, “We need to protect the sector because it is adopting high technology, as airlines are consolidating their systems.
“Aviation is now a shared system. There are so many areas that are prone to hacking. The Automated Data Surveillance Broadcast is vulnerable; wrong information can be input into the system. But how much awareness are we creating on this?’’
