The Federal Govt during the Minister of Gliding and Aerospace Building, Festus Keyamo, has disclosed ongoing efforts to deal with the prime charge of wind tickets for each home and global walk, future additionally saying improvements in airport security and safety.
Keyamo disclosed this in his remarks on the Ministerial Press Briefing on Thursday in Abuja.
Talking at the factor, he defined key components contributing to exorbitant fares, together with restricted get admission to to reasonably priced airplane leasing, trapped price range of international airways, and prime airport taxes.
Keyamo famous that Nigerian airways attempt to hire airplane at aggressive charges, forcing them to go for expensive leasing or outright acquire of airplane, which in the end impacts price tag costs.
“We have domestic tickets and we have international tickets. I talked about domestic tickets and the fact that we don’t have access to lease aircraft at a very cheap cost. We will only go for the very expensive option of leasing aircraft or buying aircraft. We are addressing that. We will see the results very soon with the Cape Town Convention and the Dublin Conference we are going to. The deals are coming in, so we will see the results then,” he stated.
On enhancements in safety gaps, he stated, “We are happy to report that Abuja and Lagos International Airport also achieved a recertification and in recertifying it, they closed more than 130 gaps at Abuja and Lagos airport. And so there’s a lot of improvement in terms of safety and security in those airports,” Keyamo mentioned.
He added that those upgrades had been vital to make stronger Nigeria’s flight requirements, specifically at its key global access issues.
“And those are our two major international gateways, including Kano also,” he added.
The minister additionally addressed the problem of trapped price range, which had affected international airways working in Nigeria. Airways had been not able to repatriate profits from price tag gross sales because of a deficit of foreign currencies liquidity on the Central Warehouse of Nigeria.
“There was once a life after we got here to place of business, there have been airways that had a three-year backlog of price range trapped in Nigeria. We had the Naira in CBN and that’s the gross sales of tickets. When their brokers promote tickets to you in Naira, the ones nairas are evacuated and dropped within the CBN. CBN will now get the greenback identical and repatriate.
“That is how it is done so that the tickets will be sold in Naira. All of these tickets were sold in Naira for three years plus, four years, but the CBN had no liquidity. They had no liquidity, no dollar equivalent to send to these foreign airlines, so the funds were trapped. It’s not that they were owing, the Naira was there, but they were trapped. No dollar,” Keyamo defined.
“Because of the deft policies of this government on the removal of subsidy and floating of the Naira, liquidity began to rise. That’s why I said earlier when I was thanking the President for the unusual attention he is paying to aviation, one of the first things the President did when liquidity began to rise in the CBN, the first thing was clearing the backlog of the trapped funds for aviation. $893bn was cleared of trapped funds,” he mentioned.
He additionally uncovered how international airways had intentionally inflated price tag costs for Nigerian travellers because of uncertainties over once they would be capable to repatriate their profits.
“We called international airlines; what they used to do, they said, if you want to buy international tickets, you will see business class, Z, Z grade, J, different grades, but it’s all the same. One can be N2m cheaper than the other. Those ones, they opened it for countries they knew that once they sold the ticket, they could get their money immediately. But they now opened only the high fare for Nigerian passengers, since the last 3-4 years,” he seen.
In keeping with him, airways prepared prime price tag costs for Nigerian passengers as a result of they feared foreign money depreciation would erode the worth in their profits earlier than they might convert them to bucks.
“They said because they were taking into account inflationary rates of the money that will be trapped, they don’t know where they will get the money back, so they were building on top of it, inflationary rates, that by the time they want to get the money back, the Naira may have collapsed. So instead of selling a ticket for N2m or N3m, they will sell it for 7m. Whereas Ghana will sell it for that price. Ghana is cheaper than Nigeria. This was an issue of policy,” he stated.
To opposite the rage, the federal government is actively attractive with global airways to safeguard that fares for Nigerian passengers replicate the cleared backlog of trapped price range.
“President Bola Ahmed Tinubu, being very smart on this, he cleared that first. And so we called them and said, look, it was recently we called them, you have been enjoying this high price because Nigerians were paying. So by the time we cleared this thing, they were still enjoying the high fares. We said, no, you cannot continue to enjoy it. We have cleared the backlog, so you cannot continue to open up the high tickets only to Nigerian passengers,” Keyamo mentioned.
The Nigerian Civil Gliding Authority is eminent discussions with airways to safeguard they alter their pricing, future additionally addressing alternative cost-related problems, together with taxation.
“So that discussion is going on now. NCAA is championing that, and I think they held a parliament with them recently on that, with one or two other factors in terms of high taxation. Our airport, they say, is the highest in Africa, their taxes,” he stated.
He said that top government-imposed taxes at Nigerian airports give a contribution to pricey tickets. On the other hand, he clarified that addressing those taxes will require collaboration with the Ministry of Finance.
“Nigerian Airspace Management Authority and Federal Airport Authority of Nigeria, are looking at them to see what we can do about it. Because it’s not my call. We have to talk to the Minister of Finance to do that. So don’t look at the Aviation Minister alone. I’m not in charge of revenue. I have no right to say I will reduce revenue. The money is not my money,” he added.
He additional famous that airways issue those prime taxes into price tag costs, passing the prices directly to passengers.
“The taxes imposed in our airports and navigation routes, they say, is one of the highest in Africa. And the airlines come here, they bill that too because they have to pay. And that trickles down to the passengers. So we will tackle that,” he stated.