How Naira Marley fooled Airline operator to attend concert in Abuja
.As Airline’s chairman apologises to Aviation Minister
Chairman/Chief Executive Officer of Executive Jet Services Limited, Mr Sam Iwuajoku, the airline suspended by the Federal Government for ferrying Nigerian musician, Azeez Fashola also known as Naira Marley has apologized to the Minister of Aviation, Hadi Sirika for being misled that the flight was operated to airlift Minister of Works, Mr Babatunde Fashola and not the popular musician.
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Iwuajoku in a letter addressed to Sirika dated June 15, 2020, titled, “Flight for 13/06/2020 done by Executive Jet Services to Abuja”, stated, “We hereby apologized for the above flight, with your permit ref: FMA/ATMD/0175/V/V/1268 dated June 11, 2020”.
Explaining the mix up, he said the flight was to carry a Judge to Abuja on Sunday, June 12, 2020 as requested and the permit was granted based on the application but unfortunately when he called the judge on Saturday morning to inform him that they had the permit, the Judge said that he had reached Abuja already with a different flight that someone gave him a lift to Abuja.
His words, “So, on Saturday morning June 13, 2020, my staff called me that they have a charter flight to Abuja and that the passengers are already in the lounge as a rule passenger manifest is always sent to me before any departure.”
“When I went through the manifest and I saw FASHOLA BABATUNDE, I thought it was the Honourable Minister of Works going to Abuja with his men; so, we decided to do the flight since he is a serving Minister of the Federal Republic of Nigeria. I didn’t know that it was a bunch of useless people. We are very sorry for this mistake and we promise that this would not happen again.”
Iwuajoku gave the manifest of the flight to include Adewunmi Segun, Chinonso Opara, Fashola Babatunde, Fashola Adeshina, Adeyeye Tobi, Michael Opeyemi.
Others are Idowu Emmanuel, Seyi Awonuga, Wisdom Intoto and Abayomi Akin.
The Federal Government had on Monday suspended Executive Jets Services for flying popular musician Azeez Fashola is popularly known as Naira Marley contrary to the approval it was granted.
The musician was flown from Lagos to Abuja by the airline despite COVID-19 restrictions after approval of aviation authorities.
ExecuJet is a leading global business aviation organisation offering a diverse range of services including aircraft management for private and commercial airplanes.
