Plane crashes
in Nigeria: Princewill asks for judicial probe
By Eze Chukwuemeka Eze
With the Dana Air plane crash of last Sunday that claimed the lives of
over 164 Nigerians including the entire passengers, crew members and innocent
inhabitants of the site of the crash, it brings the number of plane crashes in Nigeria to 34 since 1959 when a DC10 crashed in Lagos killing all 87
people on board.
In these, quite probably, "preventable" incidents, over two
thousand Nigerians have been lost. And in all these crashes, the government of
the day has rushed to set up one type of probe or the other without
implementing the findings or recommendations contained in those or previous
reports. To Tonye Princewill the Leader of Princewill Political Associates
(PPA) and a PDP Chieftain in Rivers state,” this is no longer acceptable; we
cannot continue in this way, snuffing out the lives of great Nigerians as if
even one life is not too much. A stop must be put to this carnage”, he
retorted.
Princewill attributed the recurrent decimal of plane crashes in the
country to corruption in the Aviation Sector and insufficient regulation and
asked for a continued and accelerated overhaul of the sector.” Until corruption
is eliminated in Aviation with credible and capable hands appointed to man all
aspects, Nigerians should expect more plane crashes. I am totally devastated
with the number of causalities claimed and I pray God gives all those affected
the fortitude to bear the loss. The word tragedy does not even begin to capture
the scale of it. If we want to keep getting what we are getting, we should keep
doing what we are doing.”
He further observed that the absence of consequence was the mother of
all our evils as nobody was ever brought to book when the dust had settled.
“Previous reports on the 33 other crashes are probably gathering dust
somewhere, why won’t the 34th?” He called for a stop to the typical probe bound
to be dumped by subsequent administrations and spoke in favour of the setting
up of a judicial probe were people found culpable in this latest incident are
adequately jailed or accordingly sanctioned. There must be a cost to any wrong
doing. The period of toying or taking the lives of Nigerians for granted will
no longer be an option. I cannot comprehend the number of personal friends we
lost in Sunday's incident.
The Prince of Niger Delta Politics who returned on an Emirates flight
that landed a few minutes after the Dana plane had crashed had just taken 10
young Nigerians under the aegis of Change Nigeria Group (CNG) on a tour of
Dubai and South Africa where they met with members of the UAE royal family,
institutional investors and leaders from far and wide so they could discover
for themselves the secrets of their success. The visit had culminated with a
trip to Robben Island, the former address of the much
respected Nelson Mandela where the price of leadership was in stark view.
“No condition is permanent so change is inevitable. The question is what
role each and every one of us will play and how history will judge after that
change has come.” This is what my recent travels have taught us, he concluded.
“Like the filling of a cup drop by drop, it is hard to point the finger at the
drop which made the cup runneth over. It must be clear to us all that this
recent plane crash has to be the last.
Chief Eze Chukwuemeka Eze, is a Media Consultant to
PPA
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