The first\nbatch of the 640 Nigerians who registered for evacuation following the xenophobic\nattacks in South Africa have arrived Lagos, aboard an Air Peace Boeing 777\naircraft.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The\nreturnees numbering 187comprising men, women and children landed at the Murtala\nMuhammed International Airport, Ikeja, Lagos at 9:34pm on Wednesday having departed\nOR Tambo International Airport, Johannesburg, around 4p.m. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
A foreign\naffairs ministry official, Mr. Kimiebi Ebenfa, who was on board the flight,\nconfirmed their arrival.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
He said, \u201cWe\njust landed safely despite the delays in South Africa.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
About 313\nwere billed to leave on Wednesday, but most of them could not travel with the\nfirst flight due to lack of travel documents.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Providing an\nupdate on the evacuation operation earlier while in South Africa, Ebenfa said\nthe passengers checked in for departure at 3:27 pm.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
According to\nhim, the flight, which was scheduled for 10a.m. was delayed by the slow\ncheck-in process and immigration clearance.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
He said,\n\u201cFlight was delayed due to the slow process of check-in and immigration\nclearance.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cThere were\nalso complaints of system failure.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cOut of the\n313 confirmed for the first batch, only 84 were cleared so far,\u201d he said at\n9:35a.m. before the flight took off around 4p.m.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The South\nAfrican High Commission in Abuja could not be reached for comment on reasons for\nthe delay.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Recall that the\nproprietor of Air Peace, Chief Allen Onyema, had volunteered to provide an\naircraft to evacuate Nigerians who wished to return home on account of the\nxenophobic attacks in South Africa.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The first batch of the 640 Nigerians who registered for evacuation following the xenophobic attacks in South Africa have arrived Lagos, aboard an Air Peace Boeing 777 aircraft. The returnees numbering 187comprising men, women and children landed at the Murtala Muhammed International Airport, Ikeja, Lagos at 9:34pm on Wednesday having departed OR Tambo International Airport, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":129,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"none","_mi_skip_tracking":false},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"yoast_head":"\n