The Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Executive Jet Services, Sam Iwuajoku described his decision to fly Naira Marley, popular Nigerian singer, to Abuja as a case of mistaken identity, believing it was the Minister of Works, Babatunde Fashola the airline was flying to Abuja.
The singer shared the same name with the former governor of Lagos.
He flew to Abuja and performed at the Jabi Lake Mall over the weekend in spite of the social distancing and flights ban order still in place.
The authorities of the Federal Capital Territory (FCT) in response closed down the mall indefinitely.
The airline, which flew the singer to Abuja was suspended by the Minister of Aviation, Hadi Sirika for the flight.
But the airline CEO, Iwuajoku in a letter of apology to the minister on Monday explained he had gotten permission to fly a judge to Abuja only to learn the judge had already gotten there.
He said, “As a rule, passenger manifest is always sent to me before any departure. When I saw Fashola Babatunde I thought it was the Honourable Minister of Works going to Abuja with his men. So, we decided to do the flight since he is a serving minister of the Federal Republic of Nigeria. I didn’t know it was a bunch of useless people.”
“We are very sorry for this mistake and we promise that this would not happen again,” Iwuajoku said.
The flight, he said, “was to carry a judge on Sunday 14th 2020 as requested and permit was granted based on the application but unfortunately, when I called the judge on Saturday morning to inform him that we had the permit, he then said that he has reached Abuja already with a different fl, that someone gave him a lift to Abuja.”
