Airlines to be closely monitored during international flights – Sanwo-Olu

The Lagos State Governor has said that the activities of airlines operating international flights will be closely monitored.

This is in line with the planned resumption of international flights being just days away. Babajide Sanwo-Olu said that the action is to prevent the importation of coronavirus cases into the state.

He clearly stated that not every airline would be allowed to operate on September 5.

He said the state government is working with the Presidential Task Force on Covid-19 as well as the Federal Airports Authority of Nigeria to perfect plans for the resumption of international flights at the Murtala Muhammed International Airport, Lagos.

He said,

“In the course of the week, I will be receiving the management of FAAN (Federal Airports Authority of Nigeria) in my office so that we will review and go over what they have.

I will also be going to the airport myself to take a spot assessment in the week to ascertain the physical level of preparedness at the airport so that we will be clear and we will all be on the same page as well as ensure all the protocol that we need for adequate compliance are in place.

Going by what is being worked out, there is going to be a phased in-flow of international travels, not all the airlines will be opened up at once, we are are going to be bringing them in based on a schedule per week.

So, it is pretty much like a measured number. That way, we can actually be able to deal with it.

Also, the times of arrivals, we will ensure that there are no crowding and backflow of issues. We are working on all these.

We noticed that imported cases were beginning to appear again, meaning some foreigners were coming in, so, we needed to be able to track and monitor and be sure that once we are able to manage our own internal affairs, so we do not have imported cases.

So, the protocol for wherever they are coming from and also in the country must be strictly adhered to so that we don’t have imported cases”.