Benedict Adeyileka,
the Acting Director-General of NCAA, announced the decision in a
statement issued by the General Manager, Public Communications of NCAA,
Mr Fan Ndubuoke, in Lagos on Monday.
He
said that the regulatory authority had to take the action to protect
Nigerians from the deadly Ebola virus, currently ravaging some parts of
Africa.
The
News agency of Nigeria reports that ASky Airline is an important player
in East, West and Central Africa, operating 80 flights into Lagos and
Abuja weekly.
The airline flew a Liberian infected with Ebola virus into Lagos, where he died.
Adeyileka
said the Country Manager of ASky had been invited to explain issues
relating to the trip but that he could not offer any conclusive or
substantial evidence on the matter.
He
said that the airline manager did not demonstrate any capacity to be
able to prevent a re-occurrence or possible transportation of Ebola
victims into Nigeria.
“This
is contrary to the provision of Article 14 of the Chicago
Convention,1944, which states that `Each contracting State agrees to
take effective measures to prevent the spread by means of air
navigation, of cholera.
“Also
of typhus (epidemic), smallpox, yellow fever, plague and such other
communicable diseases as the contracting state shall from time to time
decide to designate…..
“The
International Civil Aviation Organisation (ICAO) has similarly
prescribed measures (Standard Practices) in Annex 9 to the Convention
which a state must take to prevent the spread of communicable disease in
the event of an outbreak.
“Annex
11 (Air Traffic Services) and Annex 14 (Aerodromes, Volume 1-Aerodrome
Design and Operations) require air traffic services and aerodromes to
establish contingency planning or aerodrome emergency plans,
respectively for public health emergencies of International concern,”
Adeyileka said.
He noted that the lives of millions of Nigerians were too precious to be risked on the platter of negligence of an airline.
“The
airline operations was therefore suspended with immediate effect until
it is able to sufficiently and evidently prove that adequate machinery
is in place to provide adequate screening of passengers in all their
points of operation, including profiling of each passenger,” he said.
Adeyileka directed the Directorate of Air Transport Regulation to proceed to write a letter of investigation to the airline.
He
said that the agency would also write to other airlines operating into
and out of Nigeria to ensure they put in place all necessary preventive
measures during screening of passengers.
Adeyileka
assured Nigerians that NCAA would coordinate the establishment of a
Rapid Response Health Team at the International airports, being major
ports of entry.
“This is to prevent the spread of the deadly Ebola virus in Nigeria according to International best practices.
“The authority will support all the relevant health authorities in the implementation of adequate health measures,” he said.
Similarly,
Arik Air which had earlier suspended flights to Monrovia and Freetown
has been advised to maintain the cessation of flights until cleared by
NCAA. ..May God help us..