Terminal Lounge Congestion and delays in clearing arriving passengers at the Kilimanjaro International Airport is raising concern among foreign visitors.
Some have even recorded short video clips and shared them on social media platforms.
The viral videos have not only caused the Airport management to bristle, but also prompted hot responses from the Immigration Department at Kilimanjaro Terminal.
Now, according to the Immigration Department, the passengers that have been complaining against delays at the Airport, indeed landed at Kilimanjaro aboard the Royal Dutch Airline (KLM) from Amsterdam.
The Immigration Department’s Spokesperson, Paul J. Mselle, explains that the KLM plane arrived at the terminal at about 20.50 hours on the night of November 26, 2022.
The KLM Aircraft had 317 passengers on board.
Among them there were 226 travellers that were destined for Kilimanjaro International Airport which serves the Northern Tanzania Regions of Arusha, Manyara and Kilimanjaro.
“It took 94 minutes (One-and-a half-hours) to clear all the 226 passengers through the arrival desks,” claims the statement from the Immigration Department.
It points out that the time taken to handle each traveller averaged at 2 minutes and 40 seconds.
The International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) Standard terminal clearance time per passenger is three minutes on average.
However, the statement did not clarify if the clearance time included the luggage collection time or it was just for the traffic at the passport control booths, which the immigration department has a mandate for.
After the first lot was cleared, the airport was again forced to deal with more travellers.
It seems some other 91 passengers aboard the KLM plane who were supposed to be taken to the Julius Kambarage Nyerere International Airport had been compelled to disembark at Kilimanjaro Terminal due to some technical issues in Dar-es-salaam.
These, according to the immigration department, were later cleared at the average of 2 minutes per person and discharged from the terminal exits.
And their statement insists that there was thus no congestion or delays at the Kilimanjaro Airport that night.
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