Unruly Passenger: Ibom Air Clears the Air, Apologizes to Customers

Nigeria's Ibom Air has apologised to its esteemed customers for flight disruption and subsequent delay of one of its Lagos-Abuja flight yesterday, 31 March, 2023.

In a statement issued on 1 April, 2023 and signed by Aniekan Essienette, the airline’s Group Manager, Marketing and Communication, Ibom Air said the delay was occasioned by an unruly passenger.

"We wish to inform the public about an incident on our 6 pm flight from Abuja to Lagos on Friday, 31 March 2023.

A passenger stood up and began addressing other passengers in a manner considered inappropriate and unruly, as he was making other passengers nervous.

Our crew deemed his continuous unruly behavior unsafe and called on airport security to help with the situation. Upon his refusal to stop or disembark peacefully, the security operatives were left with no choice but to forcefully disembark the passenger as a last option."

"We are aware that several videos and reports of this incident are circulating on social media and wish to provide the right perspective.

Ibom Air wishes to assure our passengers that we maintain very high safety and service standards and will never compromise the safety and security of our passengers.

We apologize to the affected passengers for the time it took to disembark this passenger, which caused an otherwise on-time departure to be delayed by an hour."