David Ogede, a lawyer and passenger aboard an Ibom Air flight from Uyo to Lagos, has given a detailed account of a tense exchange between a fellow passenger, Comfort Emmanson, and two flight attendants. Ogede, who sat beside Emmanson during the flight, spoke about the incident on Thursday during an interview on The Morning Brief, a programme on Channels Television.
Ogede stated that the confrontation began when flight attendants asked passengers to switch off their phones completely—explicitly instructing that airplane mode was not allowed.
“I heard everything that happened, and yes, Ms. Emmanson was triggered,” Ogede said. “Sitting next to her, I actually felt humiliated by the way the air hostess was speaking to her. To be fair, the airline’s instructions were clear—phones had to be switched off entirely.”
According to Ogede, the first air hostess communicated this politely and professionally. However, when Emmanson appeared to struggle with turning off her phone—allegedly due to a faulty power button—a second flight attendant approached in what Ogede described as an aggressive manner.
“You could tell from her posture that she came looking for trouble,” he said. “Ms. Emmanson was already trying to do something with her phone. Then the second hostess repeated, ‘Switch off your phone.’”
Emmanson reportedly responded: “I heard the instruction. Please, the buttons on my phone are not working, so I don’t know how to switch it off.” The air hostess allegedly replied: “No, switch it off.”
When Emmanson asked the attendant to assist her, she was met with resistance.
“She said, ‘Can you help me do it?’ And the hostess replied, ‘I’m not touching your phone. Just switch it off. I don’t have time for your nonsense.’”
Ogede noted that the back-and-forth continued until the hostess commented that Emmanson was using an iPhone and didn’t need a physical button to power it off. Emmanson again asked for assistance, claiming she couldn’t follow the instructions.
“She said, ‘Please, I can’t understand what you’re saying. I can’t read it. I don’t know where to go.’ And the air hostess simply said, ‘I don’t have time for your nonsense. Just switch it off.’”
When Emmanson asked her to spell out what she meant—such as the word “General”—the hostess began to do so but quickly lost patience. It was at this point, Ogede said, that he and another nearby passenger intervened.
“We both said, ‘What’s going on? Don’t speak to her like that.’ But the air hostess didn’t even acknowledge us,” he recalled.
Seeing Emmanson continue to struggle, Ogede asked the other gentleman to help her switch off the phone, as he himself was unfamiliar with iPhones.
While this was happening, Emmanson reportedly asked the hostess: “Why are you embarrassing me like this?” to which the flight attendant allegedly replied: “You better keep quiet now. If you say another word, I will deal with you.”
Ogede said this was the point where Emmanson became visibly upset and started shouting, using strong language he declined to repeat. The flight attendant then walked to the front of the aircraft and did not return.
Tension remained high for the rest of the flight, with nearby passengers sensing that the situation could escalate further.
“As we approached Lagos, the man next to me and I joked, ‘God help us. Let’s get off this plane before something else happens.’ But it was a real concern,” Ogede said.
He recounted that, during preparations for landing, Emmanson didn’t respond to instructions to stow her belongings. The first, more courteous air hostess eventually stepped in and helped place her purse in the overhead compartment.
After landing, Ogede noticed Emmanson briefly walked to the back of the aircraft—presumably to use the toilet. “That was the only compartment at the rear,” he noted. “When it was our turn to disembark, we left the plane and thought that was the end of it.”
Reflecting on the incident, Ogede said it could have been prevented entirely if the crew had handled the situation with more patience and tact.
“As a fellow human being and a citizen, I believe that a little humility and empathy could have changed everything. Ms. Emmanson felt singled out and attacked. A simple apology or a more measured approach might have calmed her down.”
He concluded: “I still maintain that if the first air hostess—the polite and professional one—had handled the situation from the start, it wouldn’t have escalated the way it did.”
