FlairJet, a British private charter company, which is also an affiliate of Flexjet, is to pay N1 million for violating COVID-19 airport directives in Nigeria.

The Minister of Aviation, Hadi Sirika, made the disclosure on Sunday via his verified twitter handle.

“Flairjet were found to violate our civil aviation regulations IS 1.3.3(a) Table 2(IV) 7(a) and IS 1.3.3 (a) Table 2 (VIII) (4).

“The maximum penalty for each is N500, 000.

“We caused them to pay and reported their callous misdemeanour to UK CAA, MFA and the UK High Commission,” the minister said.

The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that the company was recently authorised to conduct humanitarian flights but was caught operating commercial flights.

NAN reports that the federal government had earlier banned commercial flights from operating into Nigeria as part of measures to curb spread of coronavirus.

Only passenger flights, which evacuate people or repatriate Nigerian citizens are currently allowed to operate as all airports in Nigeria are closed to international commercial flights until at least June 4.

However, flights for essential services, such as the delivery of food supplies and items for humanitarian use are allowed to operate.