EARLY ARRIVAL OF PASSENGERS WILL EASE RELOCATION PROBLEMS: MMIA
11-09-23
By Sadiq Aminu As the problems associated with the relocation of passenger facilitation from the old terminal One to terminal two of Murtala Mohammed International Airport, Lagos begin to ease, passengers have been advised to arrive early for boarding formalities.
At the airport all international airlines and their passengers now operate from the new terminal.
The first day of the relocation of passenger facilitation from the old terminal to the new terminal was chaotic.
Both passengers and airline staff were confused in the use of the new terminal facilities different from what they had been used to in the old terminal.
To further compound the problem were those who beseeched the terminal to either see off or receive loved ones.
Another issue that led to series of complaints was inadequate buses for arriving and departing passenger movement from terminal to aircraft and aircraft to the terminal.
The Airport Manager, Murtala Mohammed International Airport, Lagos and General Manager South West Airports Mr Sunday Ayodele said, these problems noticed the first day of relocation and subsequently have been addressed.
“It is something that we must do and people must move and it is very desirable that we must move, initially it was planned to be in phases but the incident has forced us to move now, we know the passengers are passing through some inconveniences”.
While apologizing for the inconveniences passengers have suffered due to the sudden relocation, Mr. Ayodele said, passengers also have a role to play for seamless facilitation.
“Passengers that come with meeters and greeters, ten people, twenty people, please, they should stop all that, let the passengers come alone to the airport, let them go alone to the terminal building, let them do their facilitation alone in the terminal building so that we can have seamless facilitation at the airport”.
The MMIA terminal 2 manager, Mrs. Ojali Fatusi said, the facilities at the terminal are automatic and unable to operate them by stakeholders and passengers led to the hitches experienced.
According to her, stakeholders were yet to be trained on the facilities and that would have been done if not for the fire incident in the terminal One that forced the sudden relocation.
“We needed to have trained them before making use of the facilities so we are still in the process and we talking to the handlers to bring their supervisors so that we can train them on how to use the facilities we have here appropriately”.
Currently, non-travelling public mixing up with passengers have been moved away from the terminal to reduce the crowd around the area and to ensure this, Aviation security, police and air force officers have been stationed at the entrance to the terminal both for humans and vehicular movement.
One thing missing in the new terminal are the concessionaires who manage food courts, duty free shops and places were passengers can relax awaiting boarding announcement.
The Minister of Aviation and Aerospace development Mr Festus Keyamo had during an inspection of the airport directed the old terminal be shut down for total overhaul and gave reasons for this.
“The new terminal that is under used, we spent a lot of money in building it and we have to use it. The old terminal is a total eyesore, the central air conditioner is not working, the carousels are not working and the approach into the airport is smelly, it is totally unwelcoming for people coming into Nigeria and that is a gateway to Nigeria, we need to completely shut it down and use the new terminal that can also take
As the teething problems due to the relocation begin to cease, it is hoped the task force put in place by the minister to resolve the problems would do a good job.