Abike Dabiri-Erewa, Chairman, Nigerians in Diaspora Commission, (NIDCOM), has described the United Kingdom’s denial of landing permit to a Nigerian carrier, Air peace, at the last minute as outrageous and absolutely unwarranted.
The NIDCOM boss revealed this via her Twitter handle @abikedabiri on Tuesday.
“The decision by the UK government to deny Air peace landing permit at the last minute is outrageous and absolutely unwarranted.”
Dabiri-Erewa expressed optimism that the relevant authorities will swing into action and do the needful.
“I hope our relevant authorities will not take it lightly.”
Journey mercies as we await the next set of stranded passengers from the UK. The decision by the UK @UKinNigeria government to deny @flyairpeace landing permit at the last minute is outrageous and absolutely unwarranted. I hope our relevant authorities will not take it lightly https://t.co/UaFguZvnxj
— Abike Dabiri-Erewa (@abikedabiri) July 14, 2020
The British government had, on July 12, denied Air Peace landing permit to evacuate Nigerians stranded in the United Kingdom.
Daily Trust reports that the affected Nigerians had already paid Air Peace after the airline was designated by the Federal Government of Nigeria to evacuate citizens in the UK.
But it was learnt that Air Peace had to defray the extra cost for engaging a foreign carrier to ensure that Nigerians were brought back to the country without further delay.
Ironically, Air Peace had evacuated over 300 Nigerians some two weeks ago from United Kingdom.
But curiously, the British government refused to grant further evacuation landing permit.
It was learnt that the airline was directed to wet-lease aircraft from UK or Europe to airlift the stranded Nigerians.
By wet lease, the airline would lease an aircraft from a UK company which would be operated by the crew of the company.
That kind of lease arrangement is always at a prohibitive cost which the airline might defray at a loss.
But that kind of arrangement is said to be impracticable when the airline has no fewer than three B777 aircraft in its fleet, two of which were deployed to Asian countries in the last 72 hours to evacuate Nigerians from Malaysia, Thailand, India, among others.
Nigerian evacuees depart London
Meanwhile, the third batch of Nigeria nationals boarding at London Gatwick Airport, depart London today, Tuesday 14 July, 2022.
The evacuees are expected to land at the Azikiwe International airport, Abuja later today.
Upon arrival, they are expected to go on self isolation for a period of 14 days in line with the Nigeria Centre for Disease Control (NCDC), safety measures.
BREAKING NEWS.
EVACUATION UPDATE:The Third batch of Nigeria Nationals boarding at London Gatwick Airport.
The flight was rescheduled from 13th to 14th of July due to the landing clearance issues by @flyairpeace.
1/2 pic.twitter.com/6ibJDPYz2g— Nigerians in Diaspora Commission (@nidcom_gov) July 14, 2020
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