Foreign airlines, yesterday, blamed additional test measures currently imposed by some carriers on rampant cases of fake COVID-19 test results in Nigeria.
Although the airlines apologised to customers for the discomfort and additional cost, they said the measure was their leeway to mitigate the spread of coronavirus and avert withdrawal from the Nigerian route.
However, the Federal Government is considering sanctions for Emirates and KLM airlines that currently enforced the mandatory antigen test on Nigerians before boarding.
This was after the National Centre for Disease Control [NCDC] granted approval for the antigen tests to be done at Lagos and Abuja airports.
Travellers in Nigeria have expressed their displeasure with the additional safety protocol, describing it as a rip-off on ‘the unprotected’ Nigerian consumers.
There was outcry since yesterday that foreign carriers have begun the enforcement of fresh safety protocols much to the discomfort of Nigerian travellers. National carriers of the United Arab Emirates [UAE] and Netherlands, Emirates and KLM, have begun conducting mandatory antigen tests on Nigerian passengers, in addition to the polymerase chain reaction [PCR] test approved by the Federal Government and the global standard.
The test costs additional N25, 800 per traveller at the Nnamdi Azikiwe International Airport [NAIA], Abuja and N36, 800 at the Murtala Muhammed International Airport [MMIA], Lagos.
Country Manager of one of the airlines said the antigen test was unavoidable if they must sustain skeletal operations during the pandemic, saying the PCR tests “appear to have been compromised with a lot of suspicious outcomes.”
However, in the last few months, it has become common knowledge that fake test result claims and certification were being bought at the Murtala Mohammed Airport in Lagos and Nnamdi Azikiwe International Airport, Abuja respectively.
By Afolami Ayodeji Lawrence [Lagos]