Foreign airlines cart away N231billion from Nigeria in 2013
The Director General ,Nigerian Civil Aviation Authority, NCAA, Captain Usman Mukhtar yesterday revealed that foreign airlines are making fortunes in the Nigerian aviation industry while local airlines are still playing from the fringes.
According to Capt. Mukhtar, the foreign airlines made N231 billion in tickets sales in 2013, while domestic airlines made N73 billion in tickets sales in the same year.
He made this revelation while presenting a keynote address at the 20th Annual Seminar of the League of Airport and Aviation Correspondents (LAAC) .
He said “in 2013, the total amount of ticket sold by domestic airlines was N73 billion. On the other hand, the foreign airlines sold tickets worth N231 billion in the same year”.
Continuing he said the “domestic airlines were able to ferry 5 million passengers across Nigeria in 2013.On the West Coast route,277,000 passengers were moved. In Intra – African route 437,000 passengers and on the Intercontinental route 1.4 million passengers were airlifted.”
The NCAA DG who was represented by Alhaji Abdullahi Adamu, the Director, Consumer Protection said all these were achieved with the domestic airlines operating a total of 63,000 frequencies across the country while on the West Coast there were 4000 frequencies, Intra – Africa 4000, Intercontinental 7300 frequencies.
The added that in recognition of the increase in the volume of passengers, the Directorate of Consumer Protection (DCP) has intensified efforts to process complaints and ensure comfort of air travellers.
According to him, “Nigeria has therefore become an attractive destination for foreign airlines and ceaseless application for additional frequencies. At present Nigeria has Bilateral Air Services Agreement, BASA, with 78 countries.
However, some of these are not being utilised. In order to strengthen and widen our BASA with existing and new countries, Nigerian delegates will be attending an ICAO Air Services Negotiation Conference (ICAN 2014) from 17th – 21st November 2014 at Bali, Indonesia.”
Speaking on the impending ICAO audit he said “the ICAO Audit conducted in a few years back, Nigeria scored very high marks. But there is an impending ICAO Audit again and I am sure no one is losing sleep over that as the Authority has proven to be equal to the task.”
Capt. Muktar noted that the global average of compliance to ICAO Safety Oversight Audit is 60 per cent thus all members have subsequently agreed that all African states should strive to attain 60 per cent by the year 2017.
“Let me just intimate you with the strategic objectives of the imminent ICAO audit. The audit is to achieve excellence in Safety, Air Navigation Capacity and efficiency, Security and Facilitation, Economic Development of Air Transportation and Environmental Protection. However, the date is yet to be communicated to us.”
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