British Airways, yesterday, rationalised the offloading of Nigerian passengers on board BA75 flight to Lagos last month.
It said the decision was taken in consultation with the United Kingdom Police in order to ensure safety of the said aircraft and passengers.
In a statement made available to THISDAY, the airline said the "disruption" on board the aircraft required the presence of policemen to contain the situation which it said was regretable.
"We regret the upset that the events onboard the BA75 to Lagos on 27th March have caused in Nigeria. We have made it clear that the decision to offload passengers was made in consultation with and on the advice of the UK police, and the sole aim of this decision was to ensure the safety of our passengers, aircraft and crew.
"Offloading passengers is not a decision that is taken lightly and is a rare occurrence. However the disturbance on board the BA75 service to Lagos on Thursday 27th March was a very serious incident which required the presence of 20 uniformed police officers to regain control of the situation" the statement said.
It further noted that "Given the level of disruption on board the plane as it was preparing to depart, it was not possible to pinpoint which passengers were the most involved. In addition our crew were subjected to both verbal abuse and physical assault which, in the confined space of an aircraft, can be a particularly serious issue. Hence the police decided, with the agreement of the Captain, that it would be unwise to let all the passengers travel on the aircraft as their behaviour could pose a safety risk".
The statement said that "Of the 133 passengers offloaded following the disturbance 64 re-boarded the flight before take-off. Those offloaded were of various nationalities including British & American passengers. There was also a mix of nationalities among those who flew including Nigerian passengers".
On the arrest of one of the passengers, the airline stated that "The arrest and detention of one of the passengers involved was a police decision and is not something that British Airways can comment on.
The remaining offloaded passengers were offered overnight accommodation where appropriate and were rebooked on alternative flights".
"British Airways has a long and proud history of serving Nigeria and its people.
For over 70 years the Airline has flown from the UK to Nigeria, connecting the country to the rest of the world. We are working with the Nigerian government to ensure we continue to provide our Nigerian passengers with the high standard of customer service British Airways is renowned for", it said.


Anyway i still feel we nigerians should stop flying with them, so they will know our impact to their business

nonsense



sense

nonsense - i dont buy d apology

sense - i concur with yur statement, until d pocket is wounded

clear

im not buying ba atill and same goes for my familia, we want more than an apology but action

I presume those that had been shouting:

"just keep quiet and don't complain"

"nigerians don't get any better treatment in their own country so they shouldn't complain"

"we don't have a airline of our own so what right do we have to complain about how BA treats nigerians"

can now see that kicking off the complaint has been a worthwhile venture. Now BA realises how badly their finances could be hit if a boycott was indeed started. I don't think BA would have even bothered to come out with this insufficient and 'wisely crafted apology' if the few Nigerians have not been defiant to call for a boycott and kick dust about what happened on that flight.

Moral of the story: Just because you don't have good roads, steady light, incorruptible govt, respectable police force doesn't mean you can't stand up for your rights.

Is that their Idea of an apology?

Its either they aologise or they dont, none of all this half baked crap

I'd hardly call this an apology, it sounds more like an explanation as to what happened.
No where do they accept they were to blame for the incident.In addition their "explantion"
states that 64 of the passengers originally off-loaded later re-boarded. I was made to believe
that this wasn't the case.

Who is telling the truth?

VOR:

I'd hardly call this an apology, it sounds more like an explanation as to what happened.
No where do they accept they were to blame for the incident.In addition their "explantion"
states that 64 of the passengers originally off-loaded later re-boarded. I was made to believe
that this wasn't the case.

Who is telling the truth?

I agree, more of an explanation than an apology. I am sure BA will have official flight records and a report from the UK police to back up their story if it comes to that.

Apology my foot ,i will never ever ever fly BA till i die.

Amen

The subject should probably be changed to "British Airways explains why they acted the way they did" or something like that. . This is definitely not an apology. It's just an explanation to back up their decision.

'Apology',  'Explanation' or by whatever name you chose to call, to me it don't really matter. The highlight to me is that British Airways can be held to account and get them to go on the offensive to try to explain their position.  This is a strong position shift from the we-kick-those-rowdy-nigerians-off-our-planes-and-we-don't-owe-anyone-no-explanation stance they had earlier taken. if not for the adamant nature of the Nigerians that stood up to be counted, it would have been 'just another incident'.

Furthermore if their "The arrest and detention of one of the passengers involved was a police decision and is not something that British Airways can comment on" stance is strictly a police affair, could the same be said about the ban they imposed on him. That has no correlation with the police issue and they are yet to comment on that.


Nigerians, American-Nigerians, British-Nigerians, British of Nigerian parentage, 3rd generation american of nigerian ancestry or whatever class you think you belong to: Respect is a mutual 2-way street, a national don't deserve less respect based on the bad roads, lack of national airline, corrupt police force in his country. Respect is an inalienable right - that is why it is part of the United Nations Human Rights Charter.

Until BA realizes that with Nigerians you don't take their money with the right hand and slap their faces with the left hand, they are always going to be having issues.

i thank GOD for ait because they keep on talking about it like every 2 days which is keeping it in the public consciousness, the nigerian govt's stance with b.a is for them to pay compensation to the nigerians which will serve the dual purpose of them admitting wrong doing and public humiliation and it ll affect their business in nigeria too

ehie007:

British Airways, yesterday, rationalised the offloading of Nigerian passengers on board BA75 flight to Lagos last month.
It said the decision was taken in consultation with the United Kingdom Police in order to ensure safety of the said aircraft and passengers.
In a statement made available to THISDAY, the airline said the "disruption" on board the aircraft required the presence of policemen to contain the situation which it said was regretable.
"We regret the upset that the events onboard the BA75 to Lagos on 27th March have caused in Nigeria. We have made it clear that the decision to offload passengers was made in consultation with and on the advice of the UK police, and the sole aim of this decision was to ensure the safety of our passengers, aircraft and crew.
"Offloading passengers is not a decision that is taken lightly and is a rare occurrence. However the disturbance on board the BA75 service to Lagos on Thursday 27th March was a very serious incident which required the presence of 20 uniformed police officers to regain control of the situation" the statement said.
It further noted that "Given the level of disruption on board the plane as it was preparing to depart, it was not possible to pinpoint which passengers were the most involved. In addition our crew were subjected to both verbal abuse and physical assault which, in the confined space of an aircraft, can be a particularly serious issue. Hence the police decided, with the agreement of the Captain, that it would be unwise to let all the passengers travel on the aircraft as their behaviour could pose a safety risk".
The statement said that "Of the 133 passengers offloaded following the disturbance 64 re-boarded the flight before take-off. Those offloaded were of various nationalities including British & American passengers. There was also a mix of nationalities among those who flew including Nigerian passengers".
On the arrest of one of the passengers, the airline stated that "The arrest and detention of one of the passengers involved was a police decision and is not something that British Airways can comment on.
The remaining offloaded passengers were offered overnight accommodation where appropriate and were rebooked on alternative flights".
"British Airways has a long and proud history of serving Nigeria and its people.
For over 70 years the Airline has flown from the UK to Nigeria, connecting the country to the rest of the world. We are working with the Nigerian government to ensure we continue to provide our Nigerian passengers with the high standard of customer service British Airways is renowned for", it said.


Anyway i still feel we nigerians should stop flying with them, so they will know our impact to their business

We are being made to believe that the crew were subjected to verbal and physical assault by some passengers which they could not pin-point, they were still kind-hearted enough to fly all of them or put them up in hotels. Yeah right.

Nigerians should riase the stakes now that the ball is in their court.

admin2008:





We are being made to believe that the crew were subjected to verbal and physical assault by some passengers which they could not pin-point, they were still kind-hearted enough to fly all of them or put them up in hotels. Yeah right.

Nigerians should riase the stakes now that the ball is in their court.

i think they r still tryna test the waters to see if that ll be accepted,when they see that explanation being rejected they ll admit to wrongdoing ,you watch it especially since they never expected the government to feel that strongly about it seeing as our government has never really stood up for us like that b4, the next couple of weeks ll be interesting

Yeah! That don't sound like an apology though! But it's good they've been compelled 2 come out with something.
At least we are sure of two things that in a while 1) BA would be very cautious about treatment of Nigerian Deportees. 2)Nigerian passenger wouldn't be treated like sh**.

I haven"t used BA since 2003, but I hope they stopped fumigating the plane when Nigerians are boarded.

Anyways, bravo to all those that kept up the fight, and to those anti-Nigerian, pro BA , I reserve my comments!

Court Orders British Airways To Pay N2m Compensation To Nigerian
. As Another Sues For Being Handcuffed On Board

By Ibe Uwaleke and Cornelius Onuoha

THIS is not the best of times for British Airways as its Nigerian passengers are fighting back either to recover their lost luggages or to enforce their fundamental human rights against maltreatment or negligence by the airline.

For instance, a Federal High Court, Lagos has ordered the airline to pay ?9, 000 to a Nigerian passenger, Mr. Emeka Ngige (SAN), being value of the contents of his luggage lost in transit aboard the airways while returning to Lagos from London.

This garnishee order was made by Justice Ibrahim Auta while dismissing the application brought by British Airways asking the court to stay the execution of the court's earlier judgement made in June 26, 2007 by Justice Oyindamola Olomojobi directing the airline to pay ?9,000 to Ngige as judgement sum for the value of the contents of his suitcase lost by officials of the airline.

By this order, the airline is ordered to go and respect the Nigerian laws by complying with the judgement of a Federal High Court of Nigeria, which has directed it to pay the judgement sum to the Nigerian passenger for negligence.

In another development, a Nigerian, Ayo Omotade suing along with the President of the Nigerian Bar Association (NBA) Mr. Olisa Agbokoba (SAN) and the association, has brought a suit against the airline to enforce his fundamental human right for being beaten, arrested, handcuffed and detained for several hours by the British Police aboard the airline.

His offence, according to his affidavit, was that he pleaded with the colonial police officers not to kill another Nigerian who was screaming in agony on board the aircraft because he was being deported.

The deportee, according to Omotade, was being tormented as his captors who were almost suffocating him to death in manacles chained him down.

His wailings, he further complained, attracted sympathy from him and other passengers prompting him to question the treatment being meted to the deportee.

Consequently he said, he was dragged from the aircraft by the officers and made to sit on the floor at the airport terminal after being handcuffed and slammed on the wall.

According to him, as stated in his affidavit, he was prevented from travelling with the aircraft, which he had already boarded to attend his brother's wedding.

No date has been fixed by the court to hear this matter.

In that same judgment made by Justice Olomojobi, she also ordered BA (British Airways) to pay the sum of N10, 000 to Ngige to offset the inconveniences he suffered and the cost of prosecuting the case against the airline.

The claimant (Ngige) in the suit filed in 1999 had contended that he on September 19, 1998 bought an air ticket from Lagos to London and back but on arrival back to Lagos from London on board the airline's flight No. BA2075, he could not find one of his three suitcases.

The issue of the missing suitcase, he further claimed was raised by him with the staff of the airline who promised him the luggage would arrive the following day as he was asked to fill a form in which he described the contents of the luggage to enable them track the luggage.

The suit, according to Ngige, was instituted when the airline refused to release the luggage to him and wilfully withheld the luggage and instead kept advising him to collect a compensation to which he will be paid $120 dollars instead of ?9,000 pounds said to be the actual value of the items in his luggage.

In the suit, he said, he sought a court order directing BA to deliver the suitcase with its contents or in the alternative, pay the sum of ?9,000 being the rough estimate of the value of the said suitcase and its contents and any other sum of money as may be determined by the court as being reasonable and fair value of the inconveniences suffered by him.

In his defence, British Airways called no witness but argued that it took all necessary steps to locate the plaintiff luggage but to no avail.



www.nigeriamasterweb.com/guardian
they have only just started paying compensation,im sure the omotade will claim compensation through his case in nigeria and then in london if its possible , if they like they should refuse to pay then thats the end of their business to nigeria,abacha did it and nobody dies we will fly other airlines