Lagos – The inability of Medview Airlines to airlift its London bound passengers presently has been linked to the plans of some agents at the London Gatwick Airport to sabotage the efforts of the Nigerian domestic carrier.
Meanwhile, the airline disclosed it has started making alternative arrangements with friendly foreign carriers to assist it in airlifting the stranded passengers pending when it’s flight operations between Lagos and London Gatwick become normalized.
Many of the airline passengers who were supposed to be flown by the airline to London as at yesterday were still waiting for the airline to find an alternative for them as at the time of filing this report.
In a statement issued by Isiaq Na-Allah, the executive director, business development and commercial on behalf of the airline management yesterday, the airline narrated how, “After the departure of our flight from Lagos to London on Wednesday 24 January, we were informally informed by our handling agent that they will not be providing services to our aircraft.
We immediately sought the intervention of the Gatwick Authority who is expected to be unbiased but joined the fray surprisingly. Not wanting to take chances, we sought for alternative handling arrangements to avert an ugly situation but this proved abortive.
“Our passengers who were scheduled to come to Lagos on this service were therefore denied boarding and we had to provide accommodations and logistics for them with the hope that we will clear the issue the next day and then operate the service.”
The airline explained that despite the intervention of its European partner, Euro Atlantic Airways (EAA), the European agents at the Gatwick Airport still remain adamant on allowing the Nigerian carrier to operate out of London.
“Our European partner, EAA came and intervened but this also proved abortive. This we view strongly as unethical and draws a suspicious motive. In order to avoid more embarrassing situations, we protected these passengers on other alternative carriers to Lagos. We strongly regret this situation.
“As it became evident that our aeroplane will not be allowed to come and position to Lagos for our next rotation to London, we had no choice other than to cancel our London service today, Friday 26 Jan. This we effectively communicated to our passengers and protected them on other carriers. While some accepted the offer, some rejected insisting they want a particular carrier. We are presently working to resolve with these passengers.”
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The airline said it was duty-bound to state this fact as a way of letting its passengers on the route to have the accurate facts about why the airline could not airlift them as scheduled.
The Medview Airline has however expressed hope that as soon as the crisis is resolved that it will resume normal operations on the Lagos/London route.
