Airline wants new hoax charges
2005-01-11 12:59
Johannesburg - Although a Nigerian national is a free man after paying a R500 fine for threatening to blow up Johannesburg International Airport, he is not off the hook yet as Nationwide Airlines said it wanted fresh charges against him.
The Star newspaper reported on Tuesday the airline's executive manager, Rodger Whittle, saying he was horrified by the lenient sentence that Dr Temitope Oni received.
"At a time when airline security is such a priority, one would think that a strong message would be sent out to people making threats against airlines," he said.
Oni told staff of Nationwide he would blow up the airport with the help of Osama Bin Laden if they insisted on his paying additional charges for excess baggage.
He was about to board a connecting flight from London to Durban when the incident happened on Sunday morning.
Nationwide phoned the police and he was arrested.
When Oni appeared in the Kempton Park magistrate's court on Monday, he said he had made the threat on the spur of the moment.
A Civil Aviation Authority (CAA) employee, Gilbert Thwala, has also expressed outrage at the sentence in a television broadcast.
However, CAA general manager for safety infrastructure Sibusiso Machomane said on Tuesday said his company did not question the sentence as it respected the rule of law.
"CAA distances itself from the statements made by Mr Thwala," he said.
SABC radio news earlier reported that Oni had been banned from travelling on South African airlines, but the CAA could not confirm this.
- SAPA