Chigozie Amadi
The Office of the National Security Adviser (ONSA) and the Federal Airports Authority of Nigeria (FAAN) have concluded plans to eliminate multiple checkpoints where security operatives and passengers interface during the screening of international travellers at Nigeria’s airports.
Security operatives like the National Drug Law Enforcement Agency (NDLEA), Nigeria Agricultural Quarantine Service (NAQS) and the Nigeria Customs Service (NCS) have multiple check systems where they interface with passengers and screen their luggage during passenger processing and facilitation.
Other security agencies at the airports are the Nigerian Immigrations Service (NCS) and the Nigerian Police.
These multiple check points are believed to cause delays and create opportunity for extortion; whereby some passengers who resist extortion are frustrated and made to miss their flights.
The Office of NSA and the management of FAAN said they had decided to eliminate some of the points of interaction during the passenger facilitation process.
The Managing Director of FAAN, Mrs Olubunmi Kuku, at the weekend disclosed that the agency and the office of the NSA had agreed to carry out short and long-term measures to address the issue.
She said these include the creation of a joint coordination room where all the agencies can view Closed-Circuit Television (CCTV) cameras to ascertain what they are looking for.
Kuku described the development as disturbing but remarked that the issue was the first thing she inquired about upon assumption of office.
She added that she sat down with the National Security Adviser (NSA) Mr. Nuhu Ribadu to discuss how to streamline the facilitation processes.
While addressing complaints on multiple baggage checks, the FAAN MD said: “On the issues of the checking of baggage, it bothers me so much and that was the first inquiry that I made when I assumed office. As far back as 2011 and 2012 when I was in the industry, I have worked on this with the former Minister.”
She added: “It goes beyond FAAN, a lot of those agencies, Customs, NDLEA, Quarantine, Agriculture, we now have EFCC, we have almost everybody at the airports.
“We had Executive order 001 during the Muhammadu Buhari administration to move them out under the then vice president office, now we have the National Single Window, I have personally sat with the NSA over the last five weeks to have conversations with him as to how we will streamline the facilitation.
“We have agreed on a few things, the first one is a short-term intervention where we reduce the number of agencies at the airports because we have some that were doing just sort of routine checks, just moving around to observe rather than disturbing passengers.”
The second, she said, is the longer term, a joint coordination room, where there are cameras.
“So we are asking all of those agencies, depending on what it is they are looking for to move to the joint coordination room to look at the cameras and observe and for those that are more concerned with the baggage, they can move down to where we load the bags. That way they have better visibility than disturbing passengers,” she stressed.
However, she explained that the opening of passengers’ baggage was for a reason.
“I believe that came about a couple of years ago, a lot of countries had issues with scanning devices that were coming from certain countries and as such they require secondary screening.
“ You will see that some of the airlines have companies doing secondary screening on their behalf but a lot of passengers will think that it is FAAN because we are the face of the agency and the airports.
“But that doesn’t take away from the coordination room that we have, so we take responsibility, we are trying to solve it. We are trying to have dual view cameras and put them and explosive devices a bit farther so that we are doing a secondary check without opening your bags.
“If you go to Frankfurt, for example, even after you get off the aircraft and go through security, for any flight that is departing for the US and certain countries, you will see that a secondary screening happens.
“Please bear with us, it is coordination that is required not just with FAAN, the NSA has stepped in and is now helping us vigorously,” she stressed.
Over the years concerned government agencies and the media have been inundated with complaints about passenger harassment and extortion by these security operatives.
A few years ago when the former Vice President, Prof. Yemi Osinbajo unveiled the ease of doing business at the Murtala Muhammed International Airport (MMIA), Lagos, the notorious screening table, where security operatives launch extortion attacks on some passengers after viewing their luggage was removed.
But the security officials innocuously built a stall beside the X-ray machine at the entrance of the terminal, where they surreptitiously corner some passengers and search their luggage before the main screening carried out by the Aviation Security (AVSEC) of FAAN.
