At Nigerian airports, begging and touting are still big problems. The Federal Airports Authority has tried to stop this problem, but progress has been met with a lot of pushback, especially from security services. The PUNCH said that this threat is making the country look bad.
“When my British friend came to Nigeria with me in January 2025 for my mother’s funeral, she left with a bad impression of my country.” We were on the same plane, and when we got there, we went through the terminal and went through the typical airport inspections. While we were doing that, a few people came up to us and asked for money. I kept saying, “I don’t have naira,” thinking they would get it because I hadn’t turned my foreign money into naira.
“My British friend thought the incident was funny, which upset me. She laughed and ridiculed me, asking why my people would act that way while they were in an official uniform and working for the government. Her words hurt, but what hurt even more was knowing that she was making fun of me because of something real and apparent.
“It is really concerning that airport workers, who are the face of the country to visitors, may act in such an unprofessional way. This kind of behavior is shameful and hurts the country’s image. These kinds of things show how little pride some of our institutions have in protecting Nigeria’s honor.
“Such things don’t happen very often in other countries, and it’s time for both our leaders and citizens to take responsibility for restoring respect and integrity to our nation’s name.”
Mrs. Charles, a Nigerian woman living in the United States, said this was her complaint. She was upset because begging by airport staff, especially security guards, has hurt Nigeria’s reputation in the eyes of her foreign friend.
She said that Nigeria is a magnificent country that is being hurt by a few “unpatriotic Nigerians.”
For years, many in the sector and travelers have been unhappy with the Customs inspection points in the Murtala Muhammed International Airport terminal.
People who have a stake in the situation have said that these manual checks by security organizations are old-fashioned and intrusive. Passengers often say that they are a place where extortion can happen.
On Monday, there was drama in the Senate in Abuja when Osita Izunaso, the Senator from Imo West, told the Minister of Aviation, Festus Keyamo, to tell officials from the Nigeria Customs Service, Nigeria Immigration Service, and other uniformed personnel at airports not to ask air travelers for money.
The legislator said that the actions of some airport workers are a national shame since they hurt Nigeria’s reputation with overseas tourists and investment.
Olubunmi Kuku, the Managing Director of the Federal Airports Authority of Nigeria, has made it clear that the plainly unpleasant act is her top priority. She has spoken out against begging and other forms of touting at the airport in many different places.
The Minister and other people in charge of the aviation industry have not yet responded to the Senator’s call.
In June 2024, our correspondent remembered that Keyamo had promised that the government agencies involved in extortion and begging at Nigeria’s airports do not fall directly under his ministry’s control, nor are they all under one ministry. This was after visitors and Nigerians had complained about the act of begging, which has taken over Nigerian aerodromes.
The minister wrote on his official X account on a Sunday that work is at full speed ahead to make sure that the ministers of the relevant ministries work with the Ministry of Aviation to put an end to the problem.
His comments were in reaction to a lot of travelers complaining about the same problem over and over again.
The Federal Airports Authority of Nigeria started putting in multi-million-dollar machines to scan both persons and luggage in April 2025. This was part of a continuous effort to stop touting, extortion, and excessive delays caused by having to undertake repeated manual checks at Nigerian airports.
These high-tech screening machines were supposed to take the place of physical examinations of bags, especially at Customs checks.
Igbafe Afegbai, the Director of Aviation Security at FAAN, told reporters who were touring the machines that the Customs table where they inspect luggage would be taken down in a week.
The new equipment, which include six Orion 927DX units, a full-body scanner, and an itemizer, have the latest imaging technology that can provide both Classic 4-color and Spectrum 4-color views.
Afegbai added that these devices would make the airport safer by quickly and accurately finding threats. They would also make passengers more efficient and the airport as a whole run more smoothly.
Weeks later, Adewale Adeniyi, the Comptroller-General of Customs, went to the airport with the FAAN MD and reporters.
He strolled around the new machines and Customs checks for more than two hours. After that, the CG, FAAN MD, and several high-ranking officials from both agencies convened a closed-door meeting that journalists were not allowed to attend to talk further about the matter.
People at the end of the meeting didn’t want to talk about the issue at hand.
An anonymous person who was in the conference said that legal problems with the security and administrative mandates are making it hard to get rid of the checkpoints that are causing problems.
The insider said, “These things are looking this hard because not all of these agencies are from the same ministry and they have their own rules and laws.” They also said they hadn’t been trained to use the equipment yet. They also asked for space and rooms where they could see the machines on screens and make random checks.
When we asked Group Captain John Ojikutu, a retired Air Force officer and expert in the field, he stated that the minister might not be able to match the Senator’s expectations until all airport security is brought under one command to make things operate smoothly.
“I told them they need to start over.” Keyamo can’t do anything; the airport committee is in charge of the security staff because they all work for various ministries. So, they need to work together as one group to have synergy. That was what we did while we were there; they should go back to it.
“We did our own joint security here in 1993–1994, even before the Aviation GSA in the United States.” People like to extort money, so to get them to stop, we need to go back to our old technique that worked for us before.
Muhammed Badamasi, a retired pilot, also stated that he doesn’t think the minister has to be instructed what to do. He said that begging has become common in the country.
He said that this kind of behavior is widespread and that a lot of people don’t care who they are talking to when they ask for things.
Badamasi remembered getting angry with a female immigration official at Kano airport in 2023 when she asked him what he had brought for them from the Holy Land before scrutinizing his luggage.
He stressed that the problem will keep embarrassing the country until the managers of these places start keeping a careful eye on their employees and punishing those who break the rules to set an example.
His words: “I don’t think he needs to be told what to do.” This country has a lot of people that beg. People in the commercial and public sectors all around the country ask for money as if they don’t have a job. They don’t care who it is.
I had to yell at a female immigration official at Kano airport in 2023 for asking me what I brought for them from the Holy Land before checking my bags. The problem will keep embarrassing us as a nation unless the managers of these places watch their employees and punish them as a lesson to others.
“The minister knows that it’s hard for one person to do.”
We tried to talk to FAAN’s spokesperson, Henry Agbebire, about what is going on, but he didn’t answer his phone or respond to texts.
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