Posted by By UCHE USIM on
The search for the missing Beechcraft 1900D aircraft of Wings Aviation has reached a dead end, as experts from the United Kingdom invited by the National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA) to help recover the airplane have replied that they cannot perform any magic or go further than NEMA has.
The search for the missing Beechcraft 1900D aircraft of Wings Aviation has reached a dead end, as experts from the United Kingdom invited by the National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA) to help recover the airplane have replied that they cannot perform any magic or go further than NEMA has.
This is coming at a time as Search and Rescue experts from the United States have, for several weeks running, kept mum over the assistance sought by NEMA.
NEMA Director of Search and Rescue, Air Commodore D.A Shuaibu, told Daily Sun on phone that the over one month old search is still continuing despite lack of assistance from countries with greater technology.
"The search is still on. It has not been called off. We reached out to United Kingdom and the USA for assistance in recovering the missing airplane. UK told us that they cannot do more than what we've done so far, while USA have kept silente and not replied us till now. That's the situation. We're still searching," Shuaibu said.
Another obstacle before NEMA in the recovering efforts, is lack of entry permit to carry out the search in Cameroon.
"We do not have any permit yet to search Cameroon. We're waiting for it and we won't just move without it. I don't know why going into Cameroon is delayed but I'm sure that if there are any diplomatic hiccups, that would be handled by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and not NEMA. So, we're waiting for clearance. Anyone who goes into Cameroon without due permission or clearance is simply on his/her own," Shuaibu explained.
The Federal Government and aviation experts believe that the aircraft might have either crashed in Cross River State or strayed into the Cameroon.
More so, there are insinuations from various quarters that Cameroon may have clues as to the whereabouts of the missing 19-seater turbo prop, but deliberately refused to grant entry rights ,as the country is flexing muscles with Nigeria over the Bakassi issue.
According to an industry source, "the Federal Government believes that if the aircraft did not crash, Cameroon would be the next destination when it left Nigeria because it followed the Ikom flight route from Enugu to Bebi, which also leads to the Central African country."
Since the disappearance of the aircraft on March 15, the Federal Government has been worried over the development, especially after some aviation agencies announced that the airplane had been recovered when it was not.
Furthermore, the government had been reaching out to Cameroon. It wrote two letters to the Central Africa's nation's embassy in Nigeria, but unfortunately, the letters were not replied.
In addition, a delegation, led by the Minister of Foreign Affairs, Chief Ojo Maduekwe, with some members of the committee set up by government to investigate the disappearance of the aircraft, including the Senior Special Assistant to the President on Aviation, Capt Shehu Iyal, was sent to Cameroon to seek ways of carrying out the search in that country.
The committee, headed by Air Vice Marchal S. A. Atawodi, was also charged to examine the statutory responsibility of all relevant agencies involved in search and rescue operations and the subsequent roles they played with respect to the missing aircraft.