Why We Appointed Airport Marshalls-Keyamo

Nigeria’s Minister of Aviation and Aerospace Development, Festus Keyamo, has said that any corruption going on within Nigerian airports must be publicly named and shamed rather than discussed in private, especially when acts of misconduct are openly carried out against Nigerian travellers.

The minister during an interview with ARISE NEWS on Sunday, said, “In issues of corruption, we must learn to name and shame openly, and it is important that for us in aviation, we put our cards on the table, and let Nigerians know that on our part, we have done our bit. We are struggling for survival in terms of doing our jobs as much as the president expects us to do our jobs. So, we must let Nigerians know that we have done our bit.”

Keyamo’s comments followed the Managing Director of the Federal Airports Authority of Nigeria (FAAN), Olubunmi Kuku, summoning all the heads of security agencies at Murtala Muhammed International Airport (MMIA) and issuing a stern warning over misconduct at the airport.

He noted, “I stand by my MD. I endorsed everything she did. She ran them by me and the directors, and very competent team we assembled at FAAN. And I said go ahead, because look, we need to name and shame corruption. Enough is enough of whispering behind and all of that. Look, what is all this idea about going to do in private and all that? These things are in the public domain. So for us, it is important that we speak with Nigerians, talk to Nigerians and for them to know that we are making some efforts.”

“It’s high time it is go public to say look, this is what we are doing, and then to sound out a note of warning to these other agencies that the airport is not a place for you to come and make money.

Keyamo then acknowledged challenges within aviation security under his watch, admitting that bad actors exist even within his department. He also revealed that many officials lobby to be posted to airports for personal gain.

Keyamo then, underscoring the limitations of overseeing all the airports in Nigeria, said that help is needed in form of Airport Marshalls, calling for Nigerian’s involvement in governance.

“There are 23 federal airports in the country and 10 other local state owned airports or owned by other sub-nationals or other individuals. There are about 33 airports on a whole. We can’t be everywhere at the same time. And so, we now need Nigerians to be involved in governance- this is the whole idea of Nigerians to be involved in governance.

“The first thing I did when I sat with my team. I said in that three month thing that will carry out string operations and go and observe, we must have a journalist, a grounded journalist or a journalist that operates with a well-known media outfit so that they can help us expose corruption.

“We want to make ourselves open for scrutiny. I’ve been calling up a few friends in the media houses, even ARISE, and said, look, come and help us with this Airport Marshall. Of course we will assist them in terms of logistics and all of that, we are going to assist them with some token for their logistics. But at this point, we need help. It’s a second layer of supervision we are bringing around all our airports. Let Nigerians know that we are doing our best,” he said.