Beware of unsolicited courtesies at international airports!

Airports are essentially locales of transference. They are the temporary stations on the way to the destination, to that destination. In other words, experience has taught me to always contemplate airports more closely whenever life and living make it compulsory for me to traverse and carouse like the carousel their inner precincts. A couple of weeks ago, I came to the conclusion, and a tentative one for that matter, that airports are indeed metaphors for our world, for your world and mine. Yes. This world of ours is like airports in our cities. Like your world and mine, airports are transit camps; they are the station before the final destination. But unlike our world, we ordinarily usually visit airports largely by choice; nobody comes to the world by force. Passengers who transit through airports are usually men and women of the middle and upper class of the society. But at least once a year, ordinary like mortals me - men and women whose chance to fly in an aeroplane usually comes when they embark on pilgrimage to Makkah and Madinah - equally congregate in and around airports. Whevever they do, they realize that they who have not travelled by air have not yet discovered how insignificant terrestrial realities are in comparison to celestial bliss.

Thus it came to pass that that brother of yours and a friend of his arrived the airport for their onward journey to Saudi Arabia. Immediately on arrival, they were met by touts and fake airport officials who showered them with unsolicited courtesies and offered to assist them go through check-in at the airline’s counter. Our brother could not have suspected any foul play. It was not the first time such would be extended to him. He knew that courtesies are usually not for nothing. Every gift of life comes with a responsibility; favours granted to humans on earth are meant to be acknowledged and paid for either in cash or kind.

Thus not suspecting any foul play, he handed over his international passport, his ticket and that of his companion to the gentleman who appeared hell bent on “smoothening” airport formalities for them. Our brother equally handed over his luggage to the gentleman for check-in. He thereafter took his seat in the departure hall. He began to wait patiently for his boarding pass and other travel documents.

Indeed it was not long after that the ‘’gentleman” emerged. He handed over the boarding pass to our brother together with his international passport. Glued to the back page of the passport were baggage tags with which our brother would collect his luggage at his final destination, which happened to be, let us refer to it as “Saadaniyyah”. Our brother was, as usual, full of gratitude to the ‘gentleman’ for his ‘assistance’. As usual, he dipped his hands into his pocket, brought out some naira notes and handed them over to the former. With that the deal was done. The ‘gentleman’ disappeared into the air, while our brother proceeded to go through immigration formalities preparatory to his embarkment on the airplane. Hours after the above event, our brother safely arrived his destination.

Days after his arrival to “Saadaniyah”, however, our brother was visited by security officials featuring the police, immigration officers and anti-narcotic personnel. He was asked about one of the luggages which he brought to the country and which contained many kilogrammes of cocaine. As expected, our brother’s instant reaction was in the negative. He denied being a drug-pusher; he rejected the accusation that he brought cocaine to Saadaniyya. However when he was confronted with the data on his passport in relation to the tag number on the luggage which contained the drug, his jaw dropped. There and then he realized that he had assisted certain drug cartel in importing the forbidden drug into Saadaniyyah.

So what happened? I asked the Nigerian officer who told this story to me weeks ago when I visit that country for an assignment. He said that the ‘gentleman’ who offered to assist that brother of ours in that airport in Nigeria was actually working for a drug cartel. After he collected our brother’s luggage for check-in, he ensured he checkedin an extra-luggage in the name of the innocent brother. Upon arrival in Saadinayyah, agents of the cartel facilitated the clearance of the luggages. While the original ones that belonged to the brother were handed over to him, the luggage containing the forbidden drugs was equally ‘cleared’. But unknown to the cartel, Saadinayyah’s security apparatus does not go to sleep. Thus the innocent traveller became number one suspect. He became a drug pusher and carrier not by choice but by chance.

The lesson in the above story is axiomatic; it is self-evident. Let us put into practice some of the core lessons Islam teaches us: that to each his burden; to each his grace.