BY Wasilat Azeez
The Nigerian Civil Aviation Authority (NCAA) has explained why the federal government reduced Emirates’ flight operations into the country.
Emirates is the largest airline and one of two flag carriers of the United Arab Emirates (UAE) – – the other is Etihad Airways.
Effective December 12, 2021, Emirates can only fly into Abuja just once weekly on Thursdays, while its Lagos flights are suspended.
In a statement on Friday, Musa Nuhu, the director-general of NCAA, said that the federal government gave the directive following the refusal of the UAE General Civil Aviation Authority (GCAA) to grant equal rights to Air Peace, the sole Nigerian airline that operates passenger flights to Sharjah international airport in UAE.
Nuhu explained that Hadi Sirika, aviation minister, had graciously granted Emirates Airline’s winter flight schedule.
The schedule consisted of 21 weekly passenger flights to Nigeria, comprising two daily flights to Lagos airport and one daily flight to Abuja airport.
He lamented that despite this approval, the GCAA refused to grant Air Peace three weekly frequencies to Sharjah, which the airline requested for.
The GCAA, he said, granted Air Peace only one weekly passenger flight frequency.
According to him, the GCAA had attributed its refusal to grant the three frequencies to the airline to inadequate slots in Sharjah airport.
“Bilateral Air Services Agreement (BASA) between countries are based on the principle of reciprocity for transparency and fairness to both sides,” the statement reads.
“While Nigerian Authorities approved the request of Emirates Airlines, UAE Authorities acted in total disregard of the terms and provisions of the BASA between the two countries by approving one (1) out of the three (3) weekly passenger flight frequencies requested by Air Peace Airlines.
“DG NCAA held a meeting with his GCAA (UAE) counterpart on Thursday 9” December 2021 at the sidelines of the ICAO Air Negotiation Conference (ICAN) in Bogota, Colombia, which ended in a stalemate.
“The Honourable Minister of Aviation decided to apply the principle of reciprocity and withdraw the approval of the Winter Schedule given to Emirates Airlines and instead approved one (1) weekly flight frequency to Abuja on Thursday.
“The DG NCAA notified The Country Manager of Emirates Airlines and DG GCAA of the new approved weekly passenger flight schedule.
“We want to assure the public that national interests in all aviation matters will be jealously guided and protected while regretting any inconvenience this action might have caused.”
Last Sunday, Emirates resumed flight operations to Nigeria after almost ten months of diplomatic discussions around COVID-19 travel requirements for Nigerian passengers.
In February, the airline had instructed Nigerian travellers at the Lagos and Abuja airports to take another PCR test on arrival at Dubai — the directive led to a ban on Emirates flights in Nigeria.
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