– Flight Operations Threatened
There is tension at Logara community, in Ngor Okpalla Local Government Area where the Imo Airport is located, following the gruesome demise of a pregnant woman, Mrs Chinwendu Amadi who was raped to death by hoodlums at Awogwu village.
Sequel to this development, youths of the airport’s host community under the auspices of Onyeaghala nwanne ya Youth Movement (OYM) have threatened to ground operations at the airport runway If the Federal Airports Authority of Nigeria (FAAN) does not take urgent steps towards improving security with a view to ensuring the protection of lives and property in the area.
Our correspondent gathered that the woman’s body was found over the weekend in the bushy premises of the airport near the runway.
According to the President General of Logara community, Chief Martin Opara, the deceased, who was a petty trader inside the airport, closed shop Thursday evening and was pushing home her wheelbarrow with a cooler containing okpa that she was selling when she was waylaid on the bush path, where she was violently raped, stabbed severally and left naked in the bush dead with her five months unborn child.
It was learned that the woman must have been murdered to enable the perpetrators to cover their tracks.
The development has since sparked outrage in the community and within the airport host community, with Chief Opara vowing that the community would not take the gruesome murder of their pregnant wife within the airport premises lying low.
“The security operatives around the airport must explain to us what happened to the woman and expectant mother in the airport premises. They cannot amass our land and up till now there is no structure put there by the FAAN.
“Except what the Imo State Government has done there recently, there is no visible presence of the federal government in that airport. This land is left to grow bushes and become threats to innocent people living around the airport”, the President General said.
Reacting to the development to while addressing newsmen, the youths of Ngor Okpala LGA under the aegis of Onyeaghalanwanneya Youths Movement(OYM), accused the Federal Airport Authority of Nigeria (FAAN) of deliberately running the airport without adequate security, a situation that has endangered both the community members and passengers.
The group also gave FAAN one week ultimatum to address the gray areas of insecurity or have the airport operations shut down.
The OYM president and Government Liaison Officer for the area, Comrade Chukwuma Anuforo, lamented that the death occured as a result of the neglect of the security of the premises by the FAAN, whose MD, he said, has refused to employ night guards shortlisted for him by the host community.
Recall that the youths had led a warning protest where the airport manager disclosed that she had sent all their requests to the FAAN management.
Their requests included the letter written by Governor Hope Uzodimma for job opportunities for the host community that are yet to be implemented as well as the issue of night guards, which the airport manager assured Comrade Anuforo to inform those already working as night guards that the FAAN management has promised to confirm them as staff to continue their job, and that she has informed the MD FAAN, and that in due time their appointment letters would be released.
He lamented that the community had severally written reminders to the Aviation Minister and FAAN for remedies to be made, all to no avail.
“We’re giving FAAN one week to fix the problem or face our own problem
“Governor Hope Uzodimma has since made efforts to lighten up the airport runway which has since made night flights possible. But, you will be surprised to note that robbers have carted away some of the lights and the lighting system.
“These things happen because of the absence of the aviation security and night guards which the FAAN has refused to employ because normally they should come from the host community.
“But on a daily basis, you see newly employed people from NAMA and FAAN, all of them Yoruba people in various senior cadres. This is because they’re in charge of those agencies and they are taking advantage of the fact that they are in charge to employ only Yoruba staff. The minister of aviation, we learned, is not even aware of what they’re doing there. This is not good”, Anuforo said.
He used the opportunity to also demand that the letter Governor Uzodimma wrote for employment on behalf of the host community, which he as the Liaison Officer, had been following up since, must be fulfilled this time.
Anuforo also demanded that a hospital must be constructed to serve the host community as is being done in other places hosting such money spinning airports.
“To our surprise, we have observed that they don’t want to also give manpower to this Owerri airport in spite of all the revenues they make from the airport.
“There’s no manpower to protect the place, yet they keep employing only Yoruba people on daily basis there.
“We see this whole thing as a sabotage of the efforts of Governor Uzodimma and also endangering the host community.
“Our position is that we cannot allow the death of this woman go like that without any serious measures by the FAAN to secure the airport. And if anything is not done urgently, we will be left with no other options but to occupy the airport and stop operations there”, Anuforo warned.
“FAAN must pay for the death of this our sister who died on the runway”.
He also called on the management of the airport to either clear the bushes within the premises of the airport or allow the village women to continue using the same farms.
“During the time our women were farming on that airport land, the entire place was always cleared. But, since they asked our people to stop farming there even without erecting any perimeter fencing, criminals are now taking advantage of the bushy area to rob our people and now somebody is already dead.
“Our position is that if they don’t want to make use of the large expanse of land given to them, they should relinquish it to the community to enable our women to farm there. At least by that way, some of these criminalities would have been reduced.
“If they don’t do anything now that our sister has been killed there, we’re going to protest in that airport”, he said.
He commended the state commissioner of police and the commander air force, for their patriotism in always sending their men to the airport for security, “if not, I don’t know how it would have been for us here”.
