By Chinelo Obogo

Aviation stakeholders have condemned the decision of Emirates Airlines to suspend flight operations to Nigeria from September 1, 2022, over its inability to repatriate funds trapped in Nigeria, saying that by doing that, the airline is putting pressure on government to release dollars that are obviously unavailable.

Industry stakeholders who spoke anonymously, said that the reason why the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) has been unable to pay the money is because it is unavailable.

“The country cannot manufacture dollars for them to repatriate over $80 million in Nigeria. When they were competing to outdo an indigenous, the only airline doing direct flight to Dubai, didn’t they know of the dollar situation here before embarking on having multiple frequencies into Nigeria. They do two flights out of Lagos daily and one out of Abuja daily, bringing the total to three daily flights into Nigeria and 21 flights every week,” said one of the stakeholders, who also remarked that at the time the airline increased its frequency, there was no passenger traffic to justify it.

“Once they heard a Nigerian airline was about to start flying to Dubai, they applied to increase the Lagos frequency to three flights daily. They didn’t need all these flights but they increased frequency to stifle competition. Nigerians are even angry at the figures they are publishing; they feel having been ripped off,” the stakeholder said.

An operator who expressed his fear about the impact of what he referred to as subtle blackmail of government said, “The pressure is on and sooner rather than later government will succumb and release millions in forex that is supposedly scarce to foreign operators that create and sustain jobs in their respective countries. This is huge subsidy to them in addition to the obscene fares they charge Nigerians which obviously have discounted the Naira at 800 per dollar.

“Yet domestic operators cannot get forex to buy spares and pay for their leases or buy aircraft. Yes, how much do we really need? Nothing compared to the direct subsidies given to foreign airlines. Government should support Nigerian aviation investors, who create and sustain millions of jobs here. Airline Opeetors of Nigeria (AON) should also mount pressure to ensure that these monies are not paid to foreign airlines, while order priories suffer,” the industry source said.

Some of the stakeholders canvassed that what government should do is to approve that airlines should sell their ticket in foreign currency.

“Foreign airlines are asking for special treatment. We can’t therefore be blamed if domestic airlines are better at the price mechanics that make them more successful on the routes suspended by foreign carriers. For me I’m going to stop saying funds are trapped, they aren’t. Air Peace should step into the gap voluntarily exited by Emirates, our media must also counter the foreign narrative that funds are trapped,” he said.