Several Nigerian lawmakers in the house of Representatives have been left stranded in the Aminu Kano international airport, Kano state on Wednesday, 23 September after regional carrier, Azman Airline delayed their flights four times.
The Abuja-bound flight was scheduled to take off by 12:30 pm but was delayed till 6:00 pm. The flight was later rescheduled for 9:45 pm but ended up departing by 12:15 am on Thursday.
The disgruntled lawmakers were on an oversight assignment for the committee on petroleum upstream and petroleum technology development fund (PTDF) which they are members of. They had earlier visited Kano state to carry out their task.
The Lawmakers which comprises Rotimi Agunsoye, Henry Archibong, and Gboluga Tinboju lamented the delay, with Benjamin Kalu, spokesperson of the house of representatives stated that a meeting will be held with the ministry of aviation and the Consumer Protection Council (CPC) on the matter.
“It is important the people we represent know where we are and the national assembly knows we are still stranded here. As we speak to you, nobody is at the counter to address us, not even the manager,” he said.
“We just came out to see the manager and other members are still inside.
“In the hall, a lot of Nigerians were left stranded. There are other Nigerians who are stranded and we are witnessing this firsthand and we are feeling it; some of the citizens are abandoned here.
“We are raising this call for common Nigerians. Sometimes, when citizens bring their complaints, it appears as if they fabricated them, but this one we are involved and we are seeing this for ourselves.
“We don’t know when we are leaving here, and we have shown interest to find out from the ministry of aviation and the Consumer Protection Council (CPC) what is happening to the aviation sector as soon as we return.”
Regarding the incident, Azman Airline is yet to officially comment on the cause of the delay.
Apparently, this latest incident is an indicator of Azman’s poor operational reliability following it’s suspension in mid-March this year after the grounding of its Boeing 737 fleet that was involved in several incidents.
The Accident Investigation Bureau (AIB) suspension was lifted in May after the noncompliance were corrected.
