I think airports being shut down is a mark of a dictator :-)
Who cares about the SLF and the freight dogs with deadlines... I AM THE PRESIDENT *said in a bad accent* :-)
Someone else expressed a lot of surprise that certain European countries send their senior officials on scheduled flights in F or C and I know that one of the African royals caused a stink on an AF flight nine years ago because they demanded to fly in F or C and all people with those tickets got bumped.
It's not unusual.
S.