Aviation
THE fanfare that greeted the reopening of the uncompleted renovated Akanu Ibiam International Airport, Enugu, is akin to covering a heist with another huge scandal. This is because the reopening of the uncompleted airport with fanfare came in the wake of the murder in cold blood of 21 unarmed Igbo youths in Emene, Enugu State, amidst allegation that two security operatives were also killed on August 22.
There was public outcry over the murder. There was discordant tunes from the security agencies responsible for the murder namely the police and the Department of State Services, DSS. The police, after prevaricating without saying in its initial position that any operatives died, turned 360 degrees to accord with DSS that its two officials were killed by the youths believed to be members of the banned Indigenous People of Biafra, IPOB. This is most unfortunate because it is now becoming a fad to brand any Igbo youth as IPOB member to justify extra judicial killings by policemen, which has become constant in Igboland.
As voices of indignant groups rose in unison against the scandalous mowing down of the youths, the federal government probably sensing trouble, woke up from its giddy position to hastily inaugurate the reopening of the Enugu Airport. Never mind that the airport has been closed for one year to renovate only the runway that is now being celebrated. Now how long did it take to renovate the runway of Abuja International Airport? Two months. The fanfare and propaganda that followed re-opening of the Enugu airport was unimaginable. Hadi Sariki, minister of aviation, was said to have moved to Enugu to ensure the project was realised. The image of a benevolent federal government working hard to better the lives of Igbo people, who never voted for him was hyped to high heavens. Media mob and social media warriors became frenzy on the wrong premise that the Enugu International Airport has been fully renovated and now will be receiving international flights. But it was all one huge farce as the facts emerged that the modern navigational equipment required to make the airport work effectively has not been installed and the building itself remains uncompleted making an average thinker to wonder why the huff and puff at skeptics that the whole exercise was unwholesome.
Sadly, what was exposed is the deficit of leadership of Igbo political elites, who joined the choruses of the wonderful work of the federal government in bare faced glorification of half bread is better than none. Selfishly, they sang, the airport is now opened and we can hop from Abuja to Enugu, the political capital of Igboland, without fear of any plane crashing. And so, they sadly forgot that Igboland is in mourning of the 21 youths who were murdered in cold blood. Aye! Except for one lone voice of dissent – Senator Enyinnaya Abaribe, minority leader in Senate, who turned down the invitation to join the unwholesome Enugu airport reopening fanfare scandal amidst mourning of dear sons, who were cut down in the prime of their lives.
It was not only Abaribe that huffed and puffed. The Human Rights Writers Association of Nigeria, HURIWA, quipped: “The idea that elected politicians of the South East extraction are falling on themselves in their sycophantic gambits to outperform each other towards pleasing the ‘powerful’ President Muhammadu Buhari over the yet to be completed renovation works at the Akanu Ibiam International Airport Enugu, South East of Nigeria, shows that there is a deep deficit of leadership in the South East of Nigeria and should be a pointer for the people, who will vote in subsequent elections to look beyond the momentary bribes of bags of salt, rice and wrappers to search for leaders, who have strong will and greater peoples friendly character to be elected”.
HURIWA said: “We are disappointed that the airport was shut down for over a year for renovation and was supposed to have been completed back in April, but the Federal Government failed to keep to their words and even when the re-opening was deferred, it has still emerged that the strategic components that should make the airport standardized, are yet to be installed, but yet over 60 million South Easterners were deceived into believing that the government at the centre has completed the renovations for which a paltry N10 billion was approved whereas the National Assembly said the same government had spent N60 billion to renovate the fence at the University of Maiduguri in Borno State, North East of Nigeria”.
Wondering why it took the same government less than two months to renovate the Abuja International Airport, build brand new road to Kaduna Airport and renovated Kaduna Airport to take in flights coming to land in Abuja, but the Akanu Ibiam International Airport was shut for over a year but almost all of the strategic components to enhance safety and standardised services at the airport are yet to be installed and yet Nigerians of Igbo extraction are made to venerate the president as if the South East of Nigeria is not part of the Federal Republic of Nigeria.
“We have just read the scientific report by Charles Ogbu, who reported authoritatively that the Enugu Airport has yet to be fully renovated when he wrote that:”Just to put the record straight, some of the pictures being peddled online ARE NOT pictures of the Akanu Ibiam International Airport.
The pictures below represent the true, factual and verified condition of the airport. The renovation of Akanu Ibiam International Airport, Enugu IS NOT yet completed.
“As of today, August 30, 2020,
(1) Only the runway of the Akanu Ibiam Airport is fully ready, which means only local flight can resume.
(2) The Night landing equipment is yet to be fixed. Which means, just like before, no flight can use the airport at night. For now.
(3) Neither the cargo terminal nor the international terminal building has been completed.
In a nutshell, the renovation of Akanu Ibiam International Airport is still continuing even as they have declared it open for use today. Most of the facilities required for international operation are yet to be fixed.
According to the authorities, the entire renovation will be completed before the year runs out.
“NOTE: what I have done here is to provide information as to the true situation of things at the airport in question. Nothing more.”
This must-have prompted HURIWA to condemn the haste in the pouring rain of gratitude to President Buhari for failing to fully renovate the Enugu International Airport even one full year after it was shut down and Nigerians were told it would be finished in few weeks.
HURIWA said the people must evolve the culture of demanding accountability and transparency from their elected politicians if they truly want constitutional democracy not to collapse. “Praising government officials for using public money to build public assets is one way of bringing into being a very dangerous and lawless dictatorship of a strong African ruler, which is antithetical to everything we should hold so dear as lovers and builders of a democratic nation,” it said.
Going by HURIWA’s position, it appears that despite the fanfare, not all Nigerians, in particular Igbos, are fooled by the gimmick of the federal government at covering one scandal of the killing of 21 Igbo youths with a bigger foible. Suffice it to state that only time will tell whether the actual renovation of the airport to bring it to the standard of an international one will materialise before the year 2020 runs out in the next four months as posited by the federal government. Then and only then will the Igbos truly celebrate and laud the government for a job well done.
– Sept. 3 2020 @ 11:35 GMT |
Tags: Enugu Airport reopening: Covering heist with huge scandal
