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The scheduled evacuation of another batch of Nigerians from South Africa was delayed by another 24-hour over late approval by the host country.
By the new arrangement, the new set of citizens fleeing xenophobic attacks in the erstwhile apartheid enclave, would arrive today by 5:00pm.
It was learnt that the earlier setting, was aborted early yesterday, as Air Peace airline could not obtain the requisite landing permit from the South African authorities until 4:00pm.
The first batch arrived at the Murtala Muhammed International Airport (MMIA) last week with 178 persons after alleged restriction by the host authorities. The “frustration” forced airline to delay the second batch of evacuation, which was originally scheduled for few hours after the arrival of the first.
Chairman of Air Peace, Allen Onyema, yesterday said the airline’s Boeing777 aircraft deployed for the operation was still on standby at the Lagos airport and would now depart by 1:00am today.
His words: “We did not take off at 1:00 a.m. as scheduled because South African authorities were yet to give us landing permit. They only gave us some two hours ago.
“Our crew waited till 3:00 a.m. (Tuesday), but when the permit did not come, they went back to the hotel. Without the permit, they cannot take off.”
Nigeria’s Consul-General in Johannesburg, Godwin Adama, also confirmed that the South African authorities had granted landing permit to the airline to enable it to evacuate the 320 Nigerians, stating that he was unaware of the reason for the denial in the first place.
Adama said: “They wanted Nigerians to arrive during the week. They (the returnees) are taking off from here midnight.
“I do not know the exact time, but they will be leaving (South Africa) midnight.
“I do not know why they were denied the landing permit. I think it is an airline operational issue. They did not get it yesterday, but they told me that it came late on Monday.”