EU's ban on African 'flying coffins' raises safety concerns and questions

In announcing the ban on virtually all aircraft overseen by civil aviation authorities in Sierra Leone, Liberia, Equatorial Guinea, Swaziland and Congo from landing at European airports, EU Transport Commissioner Jacques Barrot labeled many of the planes "flying coffins."

The recent ban and earlier similar orders will rankle many Africans for they point out that most of the banned airlines - like Thom's Airways from Congo - no longer operate and never fly to Europe anyway, while Africans have little choice but to use them to hop around the world's poorest continent.

Badara Allieu Tarrawallie, the deputy director of the civil aviation in Sierra Leone, which had 13 airlines banned, said his country had not had a safety audit by the main aviation-industry oversight group since the end of the country's brutal 1989-2002 civil war.

Still, "every state has sovereignty over its airspace," he said.

The aviation industry in most African nations suffer because of the same reasons: poverty, conflict and poor governance. And, little is being done to solve it.