•Virgin Nigeria Still Operates From MMIA

The International Air Transport Association (IATA) on Friday declared the newly constructed Murtala Muhammed Airport 2 (MMA 2) safe for flight operations.

The leader of the IATA team and the  Regional Director for Africa,  Guassou Konate, told journalists at a press briefing that “safety issues raised about the airport have been rectified” and that it is now safe for operations.

But Virgin Nigeria acknowledged the corrective actions taken at MMA2 but said the issue was already in court and any substantive discussion on it is subjudice, “we will continue operations from MMIA.”
According to him Konate, the team visited the apron and parking areas; that is the airside and discovered that they have met operational requirement.

“Just to put to rest the controversies that have trailed the question of safety at MMA2."

“As mentioned, the inspection we do for safety is between some three operators and the authority and normally, it is not for press event that’s why I am going to address it. What we did today was to go specifically to the aprons and parking areas—airside. We are not interested in other things, we are looking at safety, so what we did was to look for evidence and what we have gathered as evidence is that we found clearly that all issues, which were raised, have been addressed. So we really don’t have any concern about safety at the apron and the parking area where we went to gather evidence. So we are happy with that and with operations,” he said.

Reacting, Director General of the Nigerian Civil Aviation Authority (NCAA), Dr. Harold Demuren noted that the IATA team was invited for the second time to Nigeria to put all arguments to rest in a bid to regain the confidence of the travelling public.