By our reporter| The Federal Government on Friday announced the suspension of Emirates Airlines’s operations to Nigeria for violating COVID-19 Protocols set by the Presidential Task Force of COVID-19 (PTF).
The suspension of the airline was contained in a letter signed by Director-General, Nigerian Civil Aviation Authority, Captain Musa Nuhu, and dated February 4, 2020, with reference number NCAA/DG/AIR/11/16/285.
The government said it had been brought to the attention of the PTF that Emirates airlines had continued to airlift passengers from Nigeria using Rapid Antigen Test (RDT) conducted by laboratories that were neither approved nor authorized by the appropriate regulatory bodies.
According to the government, this is a violation of paragraph 5 of the NCAA letter with Re; NCAA/DG/AIR11/16/281 of 02 February, 2021, addressed to the airline.
“Based on the foregoing and to enable the Nigerian government to put in place the needed infrastructure and logistics for COVID-19 RDT testing for departing passengers, the PTF has directed that Emirates airlines should either accept passengers without RDT pending when the infrastructure and the logistics are put in place or suspends its flights to and from Nigeria until such a time when the required infrastructure and logistics are fully established and implemented,” the letter read.
The government further noted that Emirates had not been in compliance with the two options given by the PTF as record obtained from the Nigerian Airspace Management Agency (NAMA) indicated that Emirates airline operated flights from Murtala Muhammed International Airport, Lagos and Nnamdi Azikiwe International Airport, Abuja.
The letter also noted that this was in addition to an advert by Emirates Airlines for RDT by The Travel Clinic and Medicaid Mobile Laboratory in Lagos and Abuja, two organisations that were not approved by the appropriate regulatory bodies and PTF to conduct RDT for departing passengers.
The PTF, the letter said, took the violations of the instructions seriously and had directed that Emirates airlines should suspend its operations to Nigeria (Lagos and Abuja) effective 72 hours from midnight (23.00z) on Thursday, February 4, 2021.
According to the letter, in the 72-hour leeway, Emirates airlines was only authorized to bring passengers into Nigeria, as outbound passengers were not authorized.
The letter added that NCAA would impose additional sanctions on Emirates for the violations of the PTF directive and COVID-19 protocols and that the airlines would be informed in due time as when to resume operations to Nigeria.
Leave a Reply