Metro
FirstNation, FAAN trade words
The management of the FirstNation Airways has said the Federal Airports Authority of Nigeria (FAAN) is to blame for the incident in which two of its aircraft had an incident at the apron wing of the Murtala Mohammed Airport Two, MMA2, Lagos on Friday.
FirstNation insisted that the marshallers that handled the aircraft were not well trained, and that the incident was avoidable if the marshallers had carried out their job diligently as expected of them.
But, the spokesman of FAAN, Mr Yakubu Dati said that the agency would not make any comment until the Accident Investigation Bureau, AIB, came out with its investigation.
He also said that anyone making quick comment as a result of any incident or accident before the report was either doing so as a result of incompetence or ignorance.
He said, “Whenever there is such an incident, only AIB is saddled with the responsibility of investigating it. Until then, anyone doing so are either doing that as a result of incompetence or ignorance. As a professional, we are awaiting the outcome of the investigation of the bureau.”
An online statement signed by the spokesman of the airline, Mr. Rasheed Yusuff insisted that if the marshaller had avoided marshaling the aircraft wrongly, the incident would not have occurred.
Yasuff urged FAAN to retrain the marshallers properly in order to carry out their duties professionals.
He stated that the company understood that the marshallers at MMA2 were deployed by FAAN under a Memorandum of Understanding, MoU, with Bi-Courtney Aviation Services Limited, the operator of MMA2.
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The airline also charged the Nigerian Civil Aviation Authority, NCAA, to enhance oversight of the marshallers and their authorisation to arrest the growing incidents of aircraft damage on ground in Nigeria, which he described as embarrassing.
Meanwhile, IB said it had commenced investigation to unravel the cause of the incident.
The spokesman of the bureau, Mr. Tunji Oketunbi told journalists in a text message that its men were already deployed to the scene of the incident.
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