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President Muhammadu Buhari returned to Nigeria after 100 days of getting medical attention in the United Kingdom, but, the gadgets used to treat the president are at this point not as important as the aircraft which brought him back.
Femi Adesina, the Special Adviser to the President on media had made public that he will be returning to Nigeria on Saturday, August 19.
True to the announcement, the President flew from London Stansted Airport at 10:26 am, arriving Abuja at about 4:32 pm, aboard a presidential aircraft, with tail number 5N-FGT.
However, the plane was visible on public aircraft tracking websites and applications such as FlightAware, and particularly Flight Radar 24 where the location, altitude, speed and other details as President Buhari’s plane cruised to Nigeria could be monitored.
On flightaware’s FAQs where a question asks; Can I track military aircraft? What about presidential movements in Air Force One? The website stated that FlightAware does not track military aircraft and presidential movement flights (e.g., Air Force One, Marine One, etc.) as they are operated by the US military.
It then arouses curiosity as to why that of Nigeria’s president is made visible, either because the platforms allowed it, or more importantly, those in charge of the president’s security couldn’t quite do their jobs; technology wise.
It will be recalled that on April 6, 1994, Presidents Cyprian Ntayamira, of Burundi and Juvenal Habyarimana, of Rwanda were killed in a plane crash caused by a rocket attack, which subsequently ignited several weeks of intense and systematic massacres. According to a United Nations web post, the killings – as many as 1 million people are estimated to have perished – shocked the international community and were clearly acts of genocide.
Considering the heightened tensions across various segments in Nigeria, it perhaps was not a good idea for the presidency to have ignored the importance of cloaking the president’s aircraft. Beyond this, as it is often standard protocol to take extra measures in security for dignitaries, such perhaps should have been the case with Nigeria’s president.
CALEB OJEWALE
