QUESTIONS have been raised about the security of Hazrat Shahjalal International Airport after a handbag containing a firearm passed through the scanners undetected on Tuesday. The security breach took place within two weeks of an attempted hijack of a Biman aircraft by a suspect carrying a “toy gun”. The ineptness and nonchalance of tightening the security at the international gateway to the country have blurred the nation’s image and shown the security loopholes. The recent findings of Anti-Corruption Commission (ACC) narrated the causes, including systematic corruption, of alarming condition of the airports, both international and domestic.
A popular film star and road safety campaigner Ilias Kanchan went through the security scanners carrying a gun, not a plastic one, but the scanners failed to trace the pistol. Immediately after, he informed the police and handed them the gun. But all are not Ilias Kanchan, the lax of security can allure miscreants to stage tragedy. If so, then the Civil Aviation Authority would formulate another probe body whose report never get published and if published will never meet the recommendations — a mockery. However, the Ministry of Civil Aviation and Tourism yesterday turned down the claim of Ilias Kanchan saying that he gave false statement.
Repeated security breaches at the country’s prime airport would have an adverse impact on the country’s growing aviation industry. Insiders endorsed that the scanners are low quality as a section of officials and directors in exchange of bribe purchased the equipment that ultimately put a threat to the security of passengers. Without pointing out the main causes — corruption in the purchase, low quality equipment, and security dillydally — the authority suspended five employees.
Huge promises were made by the authorities concerned about security arrangements, and enough stories of security lapse were published in print media. Not only that, millions of taka were allocated, meeting after meeting held and hundreds of staffs employed but no development, no positive change have ever taken, except draining the budget to corrupts. The airports cannot run in this abysmal way making people hostage in the hands of corrupts and unskilled officials.
The checkpoints at airports are integral for maintaining security of every airport of the world, and so, there is no room for compromising about security needs at airports.
