Passengers Raise Alarm Over Poor Security

The porous nature of the Port Harcourt International Airport, Omagwa, is threatening the security of passengers and their laugage, users and staff of the airport and this calls for an urgent attention.

The Tide check revealed that cars parked at the airport are no longer safe. Car snatchers now apply a system of melting the padlocks used in locking cars at the airport with the use of chemicals.

It was learnt that within the past six weeks, a staff of Aero Contractors Airlines lost her Golf 3 car to thieves.

The car was packed at the premises of the airport. Few weeks after, attempts were made to steal two cars belonging to passengers who traveled, but for the security alarm gargets fitted into the cars.

The Tide understood that the sum of N1,000 is usually paid to the Federal Airports Authority of Nigeria (FAAN) for a car parked overnight, but a source told The Tide that there is no security patrol at night and that the satellite camera there does not cover all parts of the airport to make the detection of any crime possible.

There is also poor lightening system at the airport such that most part of it are dark at night, thereby giving room for anything to happen.

The perimeter fencing at the airport, which was started more than a year ago has not been completed while its access control system is not effective, just as the police check-point is noted for exorting money from motorists.

FAAN security personnel, The Tide learnt, does not have good relationship with other security agents at the airport, which sometimes results to friction. FAAN generates a lot of revenue but one wonders why there is a lot of infrastructural decay at the Port Harcourt International Airport. There is need for an internal perimeter fencing that should stop around the NAMA area of the airport with a gate to check movement of vehicles and humans from the Ipo village axis.

The management of the airport needs to sit up and map out new and more effective security measures to rid  the airport of criminal activities. A situation where people are allowed to cluster the entrances of the departure and arrival halls is not palatable because such persons are not screened.