ENVIRONMENTAL FOCUS:Nigerian airports of shame
“Dramatising
trivial things,” was the opinion of a British newspaper over commentary
by professional colleagues protesting the presence of women cleaners in
male toilets. Surprisingly, this seems to be the convention all over
the world.
These prying female
eyes largely go unnoticed because male passengers have other things on
their minds in the hurry to catch a flight.
In Nigeria, it goes
slightly and shamelessly further. The cleaner clutches a mop pretending
to be doing the floor but actually soliciting; “ Oga, how was your
flight, how’s the family?” I often observe that many men are
uncomfortable with this indecent model of sexual harassment. Why a
woman hired to clean toilets should position herself strategically to
beg for money inside the male facilities beats the imagination. Male
cleaners are better behaved, and never seen in the vicinity of female
toilets at our airports.
Agreed that it
creates employment, albeit controversial employment for the young and
able-bodied, but passengers the world over prefer to shove the vehicles
by themselves. At the Abuja and Lagos arrival lounges, the functional
trolleys are always already taken over by attendants, irrespective of
the potentials for their contribution to baggage losses. Travellers are
free to help themselves to the remaining rusty, stiff trolleys with
broken wheels and handles.
A popular adage
that first impressions matter bears relevance to the status of airports
in any country. At no institution can the foreigner make a quick
assessment of the mood in a country, the economy and culture of its
people than at airports. It does not matter whether it is an
international or a domestic terminal. At the nation’s capital, a
passenger’s journey may begin with the confusion as to whether the
departure is from the international or the local wing. The guiltiest of
the airlines remains ARIK. Departure terminals fluctuate for differing
destinations, passengers regularly paying an extra one thousand naira
cab fare for the dash to the right airport, with barely enough time to
pick up a parcel of kilishi, the cold, sun-dried meat and only
industrial product of the Abuja economy.
Separating
domestic and international terminals by a couple of miles is a Nigerian
invention that makes little sense in respect of service delivery to
passengers, as well as for security. Many foreigners arriving in Lagos
are distressed to find that an onward flight to a destination in
Nigeria results in the risk of getting out of the terminal into the
cacophony of touts, muggers and suspicious car hire services. To
compound the delay process, authorities in Lagos are smart enough to
plant a toll gate between international and domestic terminals, as
though the revenues so collected are deposited where they belong.
If security
consciousness is the international watchword, why are the scanning
machines at Nigeria’s airports always breaking down? Could a mafia be
deliberately calling for their repairs just to award contracts to a
crony? Manual rummaging through hand luggage is more common. At times
the searches are deliberately vigorous and callous where the traveller
is obstinate and unwilling to part with gratification. You are
requested to drink up any bottled liquids, and remove shoes for
scanning only to step onto a filthy and dusty piece of carpeting with
naked feet! One woman security agent in Lagos went through a
passenger’s belongings, excavating a bunch of underwear. I thought for
the sake of hygiene and disease control she should have been wearing
gloves for her job.
The Abuja domestic wing of Nnamdi Azikiwe Airport actually looks like an infectious diseases hospital from the outside.
