Nigerians often love to travel, especially during the Yuletides season. However, the economic realities may not allow them to do so this time round.
HARD times definitely await air passengers across the globe this Yuletide for the obvious reason of harsh economic conditions facing many countries of the world, including Nigeria.
Many of the passengers travelling out of the country, according to Sunday Tribune investigations, are doing so under a terrible pressure.
Mrs Titilayo Olusanya who travelled five months ago to the United States. to welcome the birth of her granddaughters and has since returned, paid N350,000 for the trip. Her hope of going back to celebrate the Christmas has been dashed as she was shocked to discover that the fare has skyrocketed to N550,000.
Mr. Fredrick Babajide, who in the last five years had made it a duty to celebrate Christmas with his children in Canada, has lamented that he has been forced to reschedule such plan to February 2017 after which the tension might have cooled down, because of the high fare.
When Sunday Tribune visited the Murtala Muhammed International Airport, Lagos, passengers who were travelling to one destination or the other said they had to cough up more money to pay their fares due to the harsh economic situation.
Sunday Tribune investigation also revealed that some passengers who will still travel unhindered despite the hardship are those who had bought their tickets in advance and those whose families and friends, based in Europe, America and other parts of the world, had helped to buy their tickets and had them sent to them.
Nigeria, the most populous black nation with a population close to 180 million people and with its huge number of citizens known to be among the world’s biggest holiday travellers, will be badly hit by the recession which is speedily taking a negative toll on airline business and its aviation sector in general.
It is a well-known fact that Nigerians across the globe spend the Christmas and the New Year periods in particular to travel through airports around the globe to celebrate the Yuletide with their loved ones.
This is witnessed in the huge presence of foreign airlines operating in the country which have continued to attest to the potentials inherent in the Nigeria’s air travel market.
Sadly, the hopes of many of these Nigerians to celebrate the coming Yuletide with their family members may be dashed as the biting economic recession may deny them that wish due to skyrocketing air fares.
According to information gathered, fares between Nigeria and the various international routes have almost doubled, with many people who had earlier planned to travel either shelving the idea or going to neighbouring countries of Accra, Ghana or Lome, Togo, for flight connections.
Prior to this period, the economy class on the Lagos-New York route that used to cost between N350,000 and N400, 000 had gone as high as N600,000 and N800,000 while the Lagos-London route went from the usual N250,000 to almost N500,000.
From investigations, fares between the United States. and Nigeria is presently fluctuating between N600,000 and N800,000 which may even increase further as the festivals draw nearer.
It is the same experience on the Nigeria-London route and other foreign routes including African routes.
On the domestic scene, the few domestic airlines operating are getting choked up with the biting recession coupled with the scarcity of forex, are not exempted from the hardship either.
Information gathered by Sunday Tribune indicated that the local airlines may be forced to hike their fares in the face of the economic crisis.
Like their foreign counterparts, the cost of transaction has doubled for the domestic carriers who now buy fuel at a higher price in view of the wide gap between the naira and foreign currencies.
Besides the expensive aviation fuel, industry experts report that the cost of aircraft maintenance is killing as this is done in hard currencies by the local carriers including the multiple charges they are paying to the government aviation agencies such as landing and parking fees.
The recent threat by the London-based insurance giant firm, Llyods, to blacklist the domestic airlines for defaulting in the payment of their insurance premiums which has been attributed to the scarcity of forex premiums, may be the last straw for the troubled domestic carriers.
Therefore, to remain in business, the local carriers, like their foreign counterparts, may be forced to hike their fares any time from now.
As the domestic carriers are pondering over this, key players in the sector have agreed that to avoid any imminent disaster, the local airlines are left with no other choice but to also increase their fares to survive the situation.
If the call for fare increase succeeds, the airlines may start charging between N48,000 and N50,000 for a one hour flight.
According to the various players, in the face of the myriad of challenges, there is no way any domestic airline could continue to charge N20,000 for a one-hour flight without cutting corners.
While it has been established that passengers now pay exorbitant fares to travel out of Nigeria due to decline in the value of the naira, domestic passengers should be prepared for almost 50 per cent increase in air fare starting form this Yuletide.
However, in a swift reaction to the issue, the Nigerian Civil Aviation Authority (NCAA) has said, the fact that passengers are paying more to secure seats on foreign airlines does not mean that fares have increased.
Speaking to Sunday Tribune on behalf of the regulatory body, its General Manager, Public Affairs, Sam Adurogboye, attributed the fare increase to the foreign route to the high exchange rate.
“(There is) No air fare hike, to my knowledge, because no such notice is filed with the NCAA as required. But because of the current rate, tickets are sold at equivalent exchange rate thereby causing an upward amount (in cost of air fare),” he said.
He, however, added that if any foreign carrier increases fares without following the due process of consulting with the regulatory agency, such an airline will be forced to bring down such fare.
Source: Nigerian Tribune