There clearly is a serious security problem at the country's biggest airport, OR Tambo International, requiring urgent - rather than seemingly laissez faire - attention from the authorities.

There clearly is a serious security problem at the country's biggest airport, OR Tambo International, requiring urgent - rather than seemingly laissez faire - attention from the authorities.

What with the rise in robberies in recent months of tourists and dignitaries soon after leaving the facility already raising alarm bells.

Only a fortnight ago, Nuclear Energy Corporation manager Eric Khetang Lerata was shot dead outside his home soon after arriving from the airport. His attackers had followed him from the facility.

Last weekend South Africa's ambassador to the UN, Dumisani Kumalo, was robbed outside his son's Johannesburg home also after having just arrived in the country.

Attacks on tourists, with the robbers using the same modus operandi, reportedly occur with alarming frequency.

Undoubtedly stricter controls and policing are needed at the airport urgently. Loitering remains a menace - as does unrestrained access to terminals by taxi touts who hassle arriving tourists for business. It is only at OR Tambo International that taxi operators openly canvass business instead of following an orderly queue system in a designated place.

More stringent security at a key installation, such as OR Tambo International, is non-negotiable if we are to ensure the safety of tourists on arrival and departure from our beautiful country.