Nigeria, July 2 -- The Minister of Aviation and Aerospace Development, Festus Keyamo, has said the private aircraft that landed on a construction road near Asaba Airport last month did not suffer any mechanical failure, but mistakenly landed on the wrong surface after the pilots misidentified a nearby road as the airport's runway.

Mr Keyamo disclosed this on Wednesday during an interview on TVC, saying the incident has now gone beyond aviation safety and is being investigated as a matter of national security.

According to him, the aircraft, a Bombardier Challenger CL-601 with registration number N989BC, had been cleared by the control tower to land at Asaba Airport before contact was lost.

"The tower in Asaba cleared them to land. Afte...