Six weeks ago a teenager,
Daniel Ihekina ,was arrested at Murtala Muhammed International Airport, Lagos, after
he had beat the security at the Airport and sneaked into tire compartment of
Arik plane.
The Airport Command of
the Nigeria Police Force has arrested yet another three teenagers namely: Lateef
Popoola, 13; Amadi Joshua, 14; and Ukpabio Onyedikachi, 14, for allegedly
attempting to illegally board some international flights in Lagos.
Commissioner of Police
for the command, Salahu Waheed, said , “These boys were found at different
times at Murtala Muhammed International Airport, Lagos. Their aim was to get
into any plane and travel out of Nigeria.
“I decided to hand them
over to their parents so they will be well taken care of and stop dwelling on
the fantasy that you can just come into the airport, enter a plane and travel.
“Their state governments
should try to rehabilitate them just like Edo State did for the stowaway in
Benin.
“Lateef Popoola is from Ogun
State; Amadi Joshua is from Ebonyi while Ukpabio Onyedikachi is from Abia
State.
“The airport is not a
place that you can just come into and travel. There are formalities. We don’t
want to see these children here again.”
Waheed, while handing
over the suspects to their mothers, said there was a need for their respective
state governments to rehabilitate them like the Edo State Government did with
teenage stowaway, Daniel Ihekina, who was arrested on August 24, 2013 after
sneaking into the tyre compartment of a Lagos-bound Arik plane.
Meanwhile, we need to
look at this stowaway issue from different angles, one, what would prompted a
14 years old children to run away from their respective houses? Is it the lack of parental care? Or i don’t
care attitude of their parents? Or the moral values that is no longer there?
Secondly, how come that
the security at the airport broke down again? Nigeria airports are the only
airport where you see an array of uniform people without even you know which
organisations they are working for.
It is high time they
over-haul the security of all the airports across nation. What if these teenagers
were members of terrorist group?
A country that cannot
secure the life and properties of its citizen need to be question? What are the
job of Police, and all other security agents at the airport? Are they only at
the airport to embarrass people or to collect
bribe?
One of the teenagers, Lateef
,said he was able to gain access to the runaway by sneaking into an airport
apron bus, but was arrested shortly after alighting.
“I am not in school; I dropped out in Primary
three. I was arrested last week Wednesday. I actually wanted to travel but I
have yet to decide where I will go. So, I just went to the tarmac to see the
aeroplanes.”Lateef added.
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