Federal government offers assurance that Lagos airport will not be neglected following its refurbishment

NIGERIA'S federal government has assured the travelling public that the newly refurbished Terminal Two of the Murtala Mohammed International Airport in Lagos will not be left to fall into a state of disrepair as has been the case on the past but will be well maintained.

As part of a nationwide airport upgrade programme, the airport has been recently refurbished with state-of-the art facilities installed. In the past, successive governments have allowed Nigeria's airports to fall into terrible states but visiting the facility earlier today, information minister Alhaji Lai Mohammed, said things will be different this time around.

Alhaji Mohammed said:“I can assure you that the issue of maintenance, even up to the cleaning of the airport, has been taken up at a very serious level. As a matter of fact, we refused to compromise at the beginning when some people came and said we must give the maintenance to local companies.

“What is important in aviation is safety and security and we will ensure we give the maintenance to competent people, best known in the world. Today Terminal One is carrying about 8m passengers per annum and you can imagine the pressure.

Responding to questions on poor maintenance of government infrastructure, especially the terminal one of the airport, the minister said the critics were not fair to government about the status of the old terminal. He added that Terminal One was built in 1979 with the capacity to carry 200,000 passengers annually.

“Even in your house, if you have toilets built for 10 people and without no expansion about 200 people are now using the facilities, you can imagine what will happen. That is why there was the need for the Terminal Two which we have completed to complement Terminal One," Alhaji Mohammed added.

He pointed out the new Terminal Two has the capacity to process 14m passengers annually. Lagos is Nigeria's busiest international airport, followed by Abuja, Port Harcourt and then Kano and Enugu.