News
London flights: Air Peace cry of frustration *Airport officials asked plane to park ‘in the bush’ – Onyema
Allen Onyema, Chief Executive Officer of Air Peace Airlines, on Monday, recounted how elements within the Murtala Mohammed International Airport (MMIA), Lagos, are doing everything possible to frustrate the Nigeria-London-Nigeria flight operations, which commenced last weekend.
Narrating a tale of woes, which he said started more than seven years ago with several stumbling blocks deliberately put on the road to the operation, which eventually came to fruition on Saturday, March 30, the airline boss, spoke of how “wicked civil servants” tried to force the plane carrying passengers on the return flight from London to park at a disused terminal near the bush as one of the series of frustrations he had been forced to face in recent past.
A guest on The Morning Show, a breakfast programme on Arise Television, Onyema, stated that it took the decision of the said Air Peace management to block planes from other airline operators from accessing their own packing lots for the said officials at the airport to finally budge and allocate the said plane the right terminal to park and disembark its passengers.
Though the airline boss did not name the said officials, or the particular arm of the airport administration they belonged, he said the incident on Sunday, was not the first time, adding that he had cause to report the first incident to the Federal Airport Authority of Nigeria (FAAN), which took steps to resolve it only for a repeat on Easter Day.
Hear him: “Let me tell you what happened yesterday at the international airport when our own aircraft landed. Thank God I was there. This thing had happened before and we reported to FAAN. Let me excuse the leadership of FAAN here. Mrs. Olubunmi Kuku, is doing fantastically well, herself and Director of Air Operations, Captain Abdullahi Mahmoud – they’re pained, they’re pained in the wickedness of the system – civil servants – the wickedness in the system is stinking.
“Your only carrier doing international operations in Nigeria, would land and you keep us somewhere in the bush, disused side of the airport and you expect us to be forcing passengers, bringing rickety buses to take international passengers to the new terminal, where these foreign airlines rejected when they opened. It was Air Peace, because it was my country that decided to go in there. They begged Air Peace to do that. We went in there.
“When they did the runway, they wanted to do the runway analysis after the lighting, it was Air Peace Nigeria begged, they didn’t have money to fuel a triple seven. A triple seven consumes about 8,800 litres of fuel per hour. It was Air Peace they brought. We even told them, let’s use our smaller planes because of the cost, but they said no, it was a triple seven they would need. We did it free of charge.
“I don’t want to enumerate what we have done both for the government and people of this country. Now, in the new airport, they would park us two kilometres away from the terminal and you expect us to be doing bus whatever. That plane that landed yesterday, it would have taken about six hours for people to exit that airport.
“Because, first of all, they put us near NAHCO shed, very far. Nobody is using that end. No aircraft, not even foreign or local. That was where they asked my pilot to park. Meanwhile C-23 at the new terminal was open where you could just park the aircraft and avio-bridge will key in. And when my captain called, they said they reserved it for a foreign airline at the expense of a Nigerian airline.
“They did it before. One of my captains, Captain Callistus Ifeanyi, disobeyed them and they wanted to punish him and I came out and Olubunmi Kuku and the management criticised that in fairness to her. They criticised that. Now, it happened again yesterday.
Our aircraft from London, was to be parked in one bush, two kilometres to the terminal and with full flight. So, imagine the time it would take to take people from that place to the terminal building. Imagine the time it would take to offload. It would have taken about nine hours. Nigerians would have hated Air Peace, because they won’t know. That was the game.
“So, you’re contending not with external conspiracies, but with internal conspiracies withing Nigeria. Some Nigerians are praying we fail. Well, the good thing is that nobody is God. The good thing is that 90 per cent of our country’s men and women are happy. That’s our consolation. But there are people out there, but they’re in the minority, so negligible and I don’t even bother with them, because they cannot scratch Air Peace – whatever they write, whatever they do, cannot scratch Air Peace Airlines.
“Well it happened yesterday and when the woman discovered this, she was livid with rage. I mean the MD of FAAN. But look at what I did. I called my Operations Control Centre who could reach the pilot, because I couldn’t connect with my pilot, I called my OCC, and told them, tell that pilot not to move that aircraft, block that taxiway. No airline in the world would have been able to park yesterday. British Airways landed and that was when they started making moves to tell us to where we rightly belonged.
“Remember, this woman had said on television earlier that a place had been dedicated to Air Peace as the home airline. When you go to Britain, you have the entire Terminal 5 for BA. But in my own country, some civil servants or some people didn’t see it. And the DG of the Nigerian Civil Aviation Authority (NCAA), was on board my aircraft. About four senior staff of NCAA were on board that aircraft.
“He had to go in because they had delayed the flight for about 30 minutes, standing in one place for 30 minutes. What kind of country is this? So, when the DG who was on board contacted the captain to know what was happening – I think he went into the cockpit and the people in the cockpit contacted the people in the tower – the airport control people and the captain told them that even the DG of NCAA was inside the aircraft, the guy said ‘so what?’
“That will show you some peoples determination not to see beyond their noses. But that wickedness will not last. One thing is that anybody that is fighting me or fighting anything that I’m interested in will have himself burnt and will regret at the end of the day.”
Afrobeat music giant, Ayodeji Balogun, popularly known as Wizkid, on Monday, set microblogging site, X.com, on fire when he took swipes at Davido and Mavin Records boss, Michael Ajereh, popularly known as Don Jazzy.
As a result of the controversial tweet, Wizkid is now trending on X. He is number 4 on Nigeria’s X trends.
During exchanges with his followers, Wizkid dismissed the very successful music producer and label owner, Don Jazzy, as an ‘influencer’, and mocked Davido for his recently leaked viral video where he was seen on his knees crying and begging someone believed to be a female associate.
The Jaiye Jaiye crooner who hardly tweets but has a penchant for posting controversial tweets set X on fire when he tweeted, “Every day I get things to say but my mouth no good”, at exactly 4:28 am on Monday, to which a fan who tweets as @demigadd responded, “Sha release song”, prompting Wizkid to respond with “Na by force.”
This singular tweet set the pace for an avalanche of conversations, resulting in Wizkid eventually taking a sarcastic swipe at Davido and Don Jazzy.
It was like the ‘On Top Your Matter’ hitmaker’s fans had been anticipating his tweet, the comment section came alive with a barrage of comments, retweets, likes and views.
As of the time of this report, his first tweet (Every day I get things to say but my mouth no good), had garnered a whopping 3.5k comments, 8.8k retweets, 36k likes and 1.3m views, and also generated a series of conversations.
At 4:42 am, a fan who tweets as @iretomiwa03 asked if Wizkid could revert to when he used to be very active and interactive on X. The fan wrote, “Can you just go back to old Twitter wiz”, to which the ‘Holla at your Boy’ singer responded by saying “That’s a bully! Let’s leave him for now.”
When another fan who tweets as @patdafenet also pleaded with him to release a new song, Wizkid responded with a viral video of Davido on his knees begging an unseen person, with the caption “Beg me like this. Send video.”
Recall that on April 15, 2024, a leaked video of the ‘Unavailable’ crooner went viral on social media. In the video, he was seen on his knees crying and begging someone.
While speculations went viral that he was probably begging his wife, Chioma, for an offence he might have committed, some Netizens speculated that he might have been begging American model, Bonita Maria for an undisclosed offence.
“With Afrobeats to the world, he simply stopped talking and interacting, leading everyone to ascribe maturity to a mischievous machine on hiatus. The moment he’s started talking again, it’s back to familiar ways. “Una Papa.” “I go do giveaway.” “I make Bollywood.” “…signed to an influencer.” Just like he never left. Same old Wizkid. Same old troll.”
Culled from The PUNCH
Nothing outside the immediate sack of Mele Kolo Kyari, Group Chief Executive Officer (GCEO) of the Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited (NNPCL), would assuage the anger of the Tinubu/Shettima Mandate Actualisation Group (TSMAG), as they are holding him fully responsible for the current fuel scarcity.
The group, which argued that the scarcity of the Premium Motor Spirit (PMS) at a time Nigerians were still struggling to adjust to the removal of the fuel subsidy, was a plan to set the citizens against the President, said in a statement on Monday, that the NNPCL ought to have preempted the current situation and stocked a large volume of fuel that will sustain Nigerians throughout this dark period.
The statement, jointly signed by the President and Secretary of the group; Abiodun Abdulrazaq and Aliyu Muhammad respectively, said that, the Kyari led-NNPCL was fully notified of the ongoing turnaround maintenance of the refineries in Europe, which it said is responsible for the scarcity currently experienced.
Part of the statement, read: “The Tinubu/Shettima Mandate Actualisation Group has noted with grave concern the unjustifiable fuel scarcity that is biting hard in most parts of Nigeria, which has continued to generate anti-Tinubu and APC commentaries, thereby putting our party in an extremely bad light.
“The ongoing Scarcity is attributed to the ongoing turnaround maintenance of refineries across Europe. This didn’t come without notice. A serious regulator or business ought to have stocked a large volume of products that will sustain Nigerians throughout this dark period. This, like other incidents, has proven the administrative weakness of Mr Kyari-led NNPCL.
“We need to remind President Tinubu that Naira confiscation wasn’t the only strategy deployed by his adversaries in the last administration to frustrate his ambition, fuel scarcity was also a veritable tool deployed. For the significant part of 2022 through early 2023, Nigerians lived with the scourge of Scarcity, yet, we were convinced to mobilize our people to vote for you.
“While Emefiele is facing the music of his actions and evil against Nigerians, we are sad that Mr President decided to reward Mele Kyari with an extended appointment. How can one man cause your ambassadors, your compatriots who love, trust and respect you to want to go against you?
“Given these circumstances, one is compelled to ask if Mr President believes Nigerians are second fiddle to Mele Kyari. It is on the strength of the above that we wish to call on Mr President to urgently sack and investigate the activities of Mr Kyari-led NNPCL to build Nigeria’s trust in government.
“If this problem is not resolved in 7 days, we will have no option but to call Nigerians out to peacefully occupy our streets until normalcy and enduring solutions are preferred in the oil and gas sector and continue to call for sack, arrest and investigation of Kyari for subjecting millions of Nigerians to undeserving sufferings.”
The Board of Nigeria Football Federation (NFF) on Monday settled for Finidi George, former Nigerian international as the new Head Coach for the Super Eagles, replacing José Santos Peseiro the Portuguese who left the job after leading Nigeria to the silver medal in the just concluded African Nations Cup (AFCON) in Cote D’Ivoire.
The choice of the former Super Eagles’ ace winger, who helped Ajax Amsterdam to win its first Champions League trophy, during the 1994-1995 season, was announced in a statement on Monday, following what the NFF Board said was the approval of the recommendation of its Technical and Development Committee.
Finidi, 52, who also played for Real Betis, had taken full charge after of the Super Eagles after the voluntary exit of Peseiro with whom he spent 20 months as an assistant before the voluntary exit of the Portuguese, during which he took the team to the two friendly matches in Morocco last month, where he beat Ghana 2-1 in the first match, ending an 18-year winless streak against the Black Stars, but lost 0-2 to Mali in the second game.
George, a member of the so-styled ‘Golden Generation’ that won the 1994 Africa Cup of Nations tournament in Tunisia and emerged the second most entertaining team in Nigeria’s debut at the FIFA World Cup finals in USA the same year, won 62 caps for Nigeria, including featuring at the 1994 and 1998 FIFA World Cup finals. He also won gold, silver and bronze medals from the 1992, 1994, 2000 and 2002 AFCON tournaments.
The 52-year-old former Ajax Amsterdam (The Netherlands) and Real Betis (Spain) forward, who made a scoring debut for fatherland in an Africa Cup of Nations qualifying match against Burkina Faso at the National Stadium, Lagos on 27th July 1991, also featured for Calabar Rovers and Sharks FC in the domestic scene before heading to Europe. He assisted Rashidi Yekini (of blessed memory) to score Nigeria’s first-ever FIFA World Cup goal against Bulgaria in Dallas, USA on 19th June 1994.
George had actually scored the goal that took Nigeria to that FIFA World Cup debut, when he put Nigeria ahead against hosts Algeria in a crucial qualifier in Algiers on 8th October 1993. The match eventually ended 1-1 and earned Nigeria a ticket to the finals in America.
George’s immediate task will be to guide the Super Eagles to victory in two 2026 FIFA World Cup qualifying matches against South Africa and Benin Republic in Uyo and Abidjan respectively, in a little over five weeks. The matches are must-win encounters, with the Super Eagles lagging behind in third place in Group C of the African campaign behind Rwanda and South Africa.
Before the football house announced the choice, there had been high speculations that Emmanuel Amuneke, Barcelona FC winger and Finidi’s team-mate was highly speculated as replacement for the Portuguese.
Wizkid slams Don Jazzy, mocks Davido for kneeling down to beg woman
Fuel scarcity: Sack Kyari now! *Group insists NNPCL boss setting up Tinubu
BREAKING: Finidi is S’Eagles new manager! *NFF snubs Amuneke
BREAKING: Supreme Court on fire! Judges’ offices razed days after Atiku, Obi’s appeal!
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