The Nigeria Civil Aviation Authority (NCAA) yesterday suspended the operations of Air Nigeria over alleged financial distress of the company which it says could affect the safety of the carrier.

Air Nigeria spokesperson, Sam Ogbogoro confirmed the suspension of the airline in a statement released to the media.

He said, “The Nigerian Civil Aviation Authority has suspended our flight operations effective immediately over alleged indications that the airline is in financial distress.”

“We wish to apologise for all the inconvenience that this order by the NCAA will bring on our passengers and wish to assure that Air Nigeria will continue to liaise with the relevant agencies to ensure that the suspension order is lifted as soon as possible.”

Also on Wednesday the company was charged with tax evasion before an Abuja High Court for failure to remit N 4.87 billion in taxes to the Federal Government.

The company also stands accused in an 11-count charge of intentionally obtaining fake tax clearance certificates to boost its expatriate quota.

This allegations brought against Air Nigeria are in line with what the company’s former Director of Finance alleged when he called Air Nigeria “flying coffins”.

Nnorom had said in the allegations published on June 4th, ““In Air Nigeria, just to renew expatriate resident permit, Bar Jimoh Ibrahim will instruct a vendor to forge all the tax clearance papers which is filed with the immigration.”

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