Ethiopia Airline, Emirates take bulk of Nigeria international air passenger

Statistics released by Nigerian Civil Aviation Authority NCAA, has shown that passenger traffic through Nigerian Airports in the past eight months had hit 2.4 million. A break down of the Passenger traffic from January to August showed that 10 of the international airlines were carrying the traffic with Ethiopian airline taking the lead with over 134,104. Emirates followed with 107, 217; British Airways recorded 86,249 while Turkish Airline recorded 70, 392 passengers. Others are Air France with 70,144; KLM Royal Dutch recorded 63,990; Virgin Atlantic recorded 63,448; Delta Airline recorded 39,196; Qatar records 38,706 and South African Airways recorded 36,868 passengers.

Meanwhile for domestic passenger traffic, seven airlines are pulling their weight with Air Peace in the forefront with over 340,664 passengers. Dana Air is trailing with 330, 370, AZMAN Air recorded 245,437 and Arik Air recorded 177,061 passengers. Others are; Med-View Airline ,156,226; Aero Contractors 138,146 and Overland 78,166 passengers in the same period under review. As a result the Nigerian Civil Aviation Authority (NCAA) generated N15.27 billion revenue from the Ticket Sales Charge (TSC) in the eight months period from the International and local airlines operators. The Director General of NCAA, Capt. Muktar Usman, told newsmen in Lagos on Sunday that the amount was generated from January to August 2018.

The five per cent TSC is the charges levied on passengers and collected in trust by the airlines for remittance to the government to ensure facilitation at the airports. Usman explained that $16.98 million (N6.11 billion) was made from the international airlines while N9.16 billion was recorded from local airlines. “The amount is recorded between the month of January and August this year through our automation system. It is expected that the amount to be collected by the NCAA will be more than double before the end of the year as passenger traffic increases,” he said. The director general said air travel demand as projected by the International Air Transport Association (IATA) would continue to grow with more connectivity. Usman said that as the second position in Africa in the July 2018 passenger traffic, Nigeria recorded 6.8 per cent increase, adding that this could be surpassed with direct link connectivity within the continent.

“There is a projection that aviation in Africa is growing and the rate of growth is one of the highest in the world. We lack that internal connectivity within the Africa region.Once those sectors are developed, Africa can witness increase in the movements for example, if you want to go to Niger as of today, you hardly have any direct link even though airlines have been designated,” he said. Usman said there had been increase in travel activities since the country came out of recession, adding that there would be further increase before the end of the year. “Yes certainly, passenger traffic is going up, do not forget that we came out of recession, but during the recession so many things happened. Now that the economy is out of recession a lot of commercial activities are taking place, so people are being more empowered which is being reflected in the movement of passengers,” he said.