Several travellers at the Murtala Muhammed International Airport (MMIA), Ikeja, Lagos State, were stranded on Friday and might not be able to travel out of the country.
This is coming against the backdrop of a system break down at the airport which was unrectified as of the time this report was filed.
Vanguard gathered that most of the systems at the airports are currently down forcing airlines to issue air tickets manually.
The development has hindered some travellers ability to access their boarding pass, thus creating chances of them missing their flights.
Most of the travellers were visibly agitated by the situation, while some are panicking,calling on the airport authority to come to their aide.
One of the travellers who spoke on the development, queried the Federal Airport Authority of Nigeria, FAAN, competence on managing the airport system.
He said: “This is quite ridiculous. Why is FAAN exhibiting such level of incompetence. Imagine the queue here.
“Obviously, most of us will surely miss our flight today. Our boarding pass cannot be generated from the system, they are using manual means. It is sad.
“FAAN need to step up their game and address this issue as soon as possible. I cannot afford to pay additional fee for change of flight date.”
Meanwhile, FAAN confirmed that there is a system downtime currently at the airport.
According to the Acting General Manager, Corporate Affairs, FAAN, Mrs. Faithful Hope-Ivbaze, “Truly there is a system downtime currently at the airport. I am not fully informed about the cause of the development, but our engineers are on ground working to stabilise the system.”
80 % of passengers going to Washington DC with United Airlines (Flight No. 613) are likely to miss their flight
It all started at about 6:12 p.m, when the queue for passengers to get their boarding pass wasn’t moving and concerned passengers tried to know what was causing the delay.
To their greatest surprise, they were told by some of the aviation staff that the airline ticketing systems at the Lagos airport weren’t working.
However, some of the passengers were able to get an handwritten boarding pass.
When our correspondent spoke to one of the affected passengers (name withheld), he said, every thing is in a mess in the airport and lamented that electrical switch to charge phones were not working.
“How can someone use 45 minutes to write a boarding pass with this number of passengers? When will they finish, the question passengers are asking now is, will the airline wait for them or who bears the responsibility of refunds for those who can not make it tonight?” Asks source.
