Ibom Airlines on Saturday spoke on the evacuation of its passenger for creating a scene by shouting inside the aircraft that President-elect, Asiwaju Bola Tinubu, must not be inaugurated.
The scene was created on Friday in a 6 p.m. flight from Abuja to Lagos.
Following the action of the unidentified passenger which caused anxiety in the aircraft, the man was forcefully removed after he refused to disembark as directed.
The flight was reported to be delayed for about one hour as a result of the incident.
The scene, FrontPage reports, is seen in a video that has gone viral.
Tinubu won the February 25 presidential election and is scheduled to be sworn in on May 29, 2023.
Speaking on the incident, the authority of the airline apologised to the passengers for the bad experience, just as it gave assurance that it would never compromise the safety and security of its passengers.
In a statement titled “Unruly Passenger” and signed by its Group Manager, Marketing and Communication, Aniekan Essienette, the airline explained the situation and how it was handled.
The statement reads in full:
“We wish to inform the public about an incident on our 6 pm flight from Abuja to Lagos on Friday, 31 March 2023.
“A passenger stood up and began addressing other passengers in a manner considered inappropriate and unruly, as he was making other passengers nervous.
“Our crew deemed his continuous unruly behavior unsafe and called on airport security to help with the situation. Upon his refusal to stop or disembark peacefully, the security operatives were left with no choice but to forcefully disembark the passenger as a last option.
“We are aware that several videos and reports of this incident are circulating on social media and wish to provide the right perspective.
“Ibom Air wishes to assure our passengers that we maintain very high safety and service standards and will never compromise the safety and security of our passengers.
“We apologize to the affected passengers for the time it took to disembark this passenger, which caused an otherwise on-time departure to be delayed by an hour.”
