{"id":76476,"date":"2025-10-11T15:29:16","date_gmt":"2025-10-11T15:29:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/?p=76476"},"modified":"2025-10-11T15:29:16","modified_gmt":"2025-10-11T15:29:16","slug":"how-valuejet-risks-passengers-live-denies-customer-access-to-medical-care","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/2025\/10\/11\/how-valuejet-risks-passengers-live-denies-customer-access-to-medical-care\/","title":{"rendered":"How ValueJet Risks Passengers\u2019 Live, Denies Customer Access to Medical Care"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><strong>By Ade Iyamoye\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>The Chief Executive Officer of Abuja City Journal, Mr. Sylvanus Foluso Ojo, has accused ValueJet Airlines of endangering passengers\u2019 lives and displaying gross insensitivity after he was denied boarding access on a scheduled Abuja-Lagos flight despite holding a valid ticket and arriving at the airport nearly an hour before departure.<\/p>\n<p>Mr. Ojo, who was traveling to Lagos for urgent medical treatment, said the airline refused to allow him board the 1:15 p.m. flight on Friday, claiming boarding had closed at 12:20 p.m.-55 minutes before take-off.<\/p>\n<p>Speaking to journalists at the Nnamdi Azikiwe International Airport, Abuja, Ojo described the experience as \u201cinhumane and reckless,\u201d alleging that ValueJet routinely oversells tickets and leaves genuine passengers stranded even after payment and confirmation.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI got to the airport at 12:20 p.m. for my 1:15 flight, only to be told boarding was over,\u201d he said. \u201cApparently, they had overbooked the flight and were looking for excuses to keep some passengers out. Even when I explained that I needed to travel for medical attention, they showed no empathy.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Eyewitnesses and other affected passengers corroborated his claim, stating that the airline\u2019s staff appeared indifferent to the distress of travelers.<\/p>\n<p>A ValueJet employee, who spoke on condition of anonymity, reportedly admitted that overselling tickets \u201cis wrong but has become a common practice.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Airport security and Federal Airports Authority of Nigeria (FAAN), officials were said to have intervened but were unable to compel the airline to allow the passenger on board.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThis attitude is unacceptable, especially for an airline entrusted with people\u2019s safety and wellbeing,\u201d Ojo lamented. \u201cI had to reschedule my medical appointment because of their negligence.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Aviation observers have repeatedly warned domestic carriers against overbooking practices, which they say violate the Nigerian Civil Aviation Regulations (Nig. CARs 2015), that require airlines to treat passengers fairly and transparently in cases of denied boarding.<\/p>\n<p>ValueJet is yet to issue an official response to the incident at the time of this report.<\/p>\n<p>Industry analysts have urged the Nigerian Civil Aviation Authority (NCAA), to investigate the allegation, stressing that the safety and rights of passengers must remain paramount in Nigeria\u2019s aviation sector.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>By Ade Iyamoye\u00a0 The Chief Executive Officer of Abuja City Journal, Mr. Sylvanus Foluso Ojo, has accused ValueJet Airlines of endangering passengers\u2019 lives and displaying gross insensitivity after he was denied boarding access on a scheduled Abuja-Lagos flight despite holding a valid ticket and arriving at the airport nearly an hour before departure. Mr. Ojo, [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":32,"featured_media":76477,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[173,172,1746],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-76476","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-business","category-news","category-travel"],"aioseo_notices":[],"amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/76476","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/32"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=76476"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/76476\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":76478,"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/76476\/revisions\/76478"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/76477"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=76476"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=76476"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=76476"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}