Festus Keyamo, the Minister of Aviation and Aerospace Development, has ordered sanctions against airline staff who released an indecent video of Comfort Bob Emmanson, who was seen in a viral video assaulting a cabin crew of Ibom Air and the altercation she had with airline staff before she was taken away.

While admitting the unruly behaviour of the lady, which he said has no place in civil aviation, the Minister condemned what he described as the deplorable release of such evidence containing indecent exposure to the public to ridicule her, saying, “That is unacceptable to us”.

The minister in a statement said, “We will not fold our arms and tolerate the debasing of womanhood. I have therefore directed that whoever released that part of the video containing the indecent exposure amongst the staff should be singled out and adequately sanctioned.”

“I have also directed that the airlines must continue to train and retrain their staff in public relations and how to deal with potentially explosive situations to diffuse them promptly or nip them in the bud, except when it becomes inevitable.”

The Minister has equally directed a joint security meeting between relevant agencies next week for better coordination of security measures in situations like this or similar ones we witnessed recently.

For genuinely aggrieved passengers, he noted there are laid-down remedies to address grievances, adding that the Consumer Protection Directorate of the NCAA had consistently advertised these remedies, and there is no point trying to take the laws into one’s hands, which may lead to dire consequences.

He said that the NCAA and the Ministry would continue to apply equal sanctions available to them in aviation on any such erring passengers, including lengthy flight bans and report the matters to other law-enforcement agencies to do their bit within their powers.

He noted that in the last few hours, he had been speaking with the Commissioner of Police of the Airport Police Command, the Director-General of the Nigeria Civil Aviation Authority (NCAA) and his team, the Managing Director of FAAN and her team, the Chief Operating Officer of Ibom Air and his team about the incident.

Ifeoma Okeke-Korieocha is the Aviation Correspondent at BusinessDay Media Limited, publishers of BusinessDay Newspapers. She is also the Deputy Editor, BusinessDay Weekender Magazine, the Saturday Weekend edition of BusinessDay. She holds a BSC in Mass Communication from the prestigious University of Nigeria, Nsukka and a Masters degree in Marketing at the University of Lagos. As the lead writer on the aviation desk, Ifeoma is responsible and in charge of the three weekly aviation and travel pages in BusinessDay and BDSunday. She also overseas and edits all pages of BusinessDay Saturday Weekender. She has written various investigative, features and news stories in aviation and business related issues and has been severally nominated for award in the category of Aviation Writer of the Year by the Nigeria Media Nite-Out awards; one of the Nigeria’s most prestigious media awards ceremonies. Ifeoma is a one-time winner of the prestigious Nigeria Media Merit Award under the 'Aviation Writer of the Year' Category. She is the 2025 Eloy Award winner under the Print Media Journalist category. She has undergone several journalism trainings by various prestigious organisations. Ifeoma is also a fellow of the Female Reporters Leadership Fellowship of the Wole Soyinka Centre for Investigative Journalism.

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