?Accuses FG of playing to the gallery

By ABDULKABIR MUHAMMED

?Former Foreign Affairs Minister, Professor Bolaji Akinyemi, has described the attitude of the Minister of Aviation and Aerospace Development, Festus Keyamo, in the unfolding issues in the aviation sector as playing to the gallery. Akinyemi expressed his opinion on the saga in his podcast, Thrumyeyes, on Thursday 14th August, 2025. In what he described as the ?donkey syndrome?, the professor condemned the federal government for acting along people?s vents rather than allow the law take its cause.

?Recall that Keyamo has recently placed a a popular Nigerian Fuji Artist, Alhaji Wasiu Ayinde, popularly known as Kwam 1, on a six-month no-fly ban after he (Kwam 1) reportedly breached security protocols at the Nnamdi Azikiwe International Airport last week. The ban was later reduced to one-month after the musician admitted he was wrong, and was now made an ambassador for Airport security protocols.

?In the same vein, Comfort Emmanson, a passenger remanded in the Kirikiri maximum prison after been accused of unruly behaviour in an Ibom Air flight earlier this week, has now been released. This was as the Aviation Minister claimed that ?these decisions (concerning Kwam 1 and Comfort Emmanson) were taken purely on compassionate grounds.?

However, Professor Bolaji Akinyemi has disagreed with these decisions while claiming that it was out of the jurisdiction of the Aviation Ministry.

??The aviation rules in Nigeria are not peculiar to Nigeria; they are universal,? he claimed.

??The Minister who had always shown this penchant for playing to the gallery to be seen as being an activist Minister?saw this as an opportunity to be popular, and now exercised powers that he didn?t have by giving instructions to the police, attorney general and the National Civil Aviation Authority?to drop the case,? Akinyemi added.

?The former foreign minister said these decisions ?show indiscipline in our culture.? He added that ?the government was just following the outcry??

?The Nigerian diplomat decried the impact the federal government decisions would have on Nigeria?s image, and projected a harsher response from the international community.

??I won?t be surprised if the international community would now take it upon itself to discipline Nigerians who fly their plane, because we don?t just travel within Nigeria,? he said.

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