Expert Warns That Three More Airlines in Nigeria May Close Before 2023

The current difficulties facing the industry, according to Foremost Aviation analyst Capt. Alex Nwuba, may cause three more airlines to go out of business by the end of the year.
While appearing on Trust TV, Nwuba, the National President of the Aircraft Owners and Pilots Association, added that the planned national carrier, Nigeria Air, won’t work any miracles to address the declining capacity of the domestic carriers.
According to the Daily Trust, rising foreign exchange rates and the growing cost of jet fuel, also known as Jet A1, are putting the airline sector in a precarious position.
Aero Contractors and Dana Air, two domestic airlines, are temporarily leaving the market, leaving voids in the domestic market even as other carriers struggle to survive.
The aviation business is in a very precarious situation, according to Nwuba, who was speaking on Trust TV. However, the airline industry is not exempt from the challenges of the global economy.
According to him, the government must implement short-term steps to ease the difficulties facing the airline industry, such as a review of taxes and fees like the ticket sale charge (TSC), passenger service charge (PSC), and fuel tax.
He claims that while temporary fixes are beneficial, the problems are in no way resolved by them.
“The problems are much more fundamental and need to be addressed much more fundamentally.”
“Everything helps. The 5 percent helps, PSC reduction helps, removal of over flight charges helps, removal of taxes on aviation fuel helps, government intervention in some matters, availability of foreign exchange helps. So when we put these together, ultimately things become a lot easier,” he added.
“This industry faces a serious problems and that problem is that a few more airlines are likely to go under if nothing is done because you can’t continue to spend and the environment is very challenging.
“Most of the airlines depend on money from ticket sales and bank borrowings… In the short term if nothing is done, before the end of this year we would lose three more airlines.”
The expert commented on the idea to lease three aircraft for the creation of a national carrier, stating that wet leasing planes to launch an airline is not sustainable and that Nigeria needs a really Nigerian carrier to have an impact.
“There is no solution or magic a national carrier will provide given the basic problems in the industry,” he said.

GOGAN Media.