High Ticket Costs, Reduced Airline Fleets To Dampen Yuletide Traveling

Nigerians traveling during the yuletide period is expected to battle high cost of airfare, flight delays and cancelations due to the crisis rocking the nation’s aviation sector.

LEADERSHIP reports that the industry is suffering from fleet reduction as commercial airlines shrink due to naira devaluation, hike in the price of aviation fuel, also known as, Jet A1 and the inability to source foreign exchange to replace spare parts.

Also, the suspension of operation by Dana Air and Aero Contractors airlines further reduced the numbers of commercial airlines fleet in the sector.

Aero and Dana Airlines had stopped operation owing to the Jet A1 and foreign exchange crisis rocking the sector.

However, confirming reduction in commercial airlines’ fleet, the Nigerian Civil Aviation Authority (NCAA), had said that significant number of airplanes operating across the country are currently grounded.

The authority said the fleet of aircraft were grounded pending the availability of foreign exchange earnings to defray maintenance cost.

With this, it showed that the remaining eight active airlines are operating a cumulative 38.77 per cent fleet capacity, with a total of 60 out of 98 listed aeroplanes grounded.

Air Peace airline is the market leader with over 40 per cent of the total domestic operation as at 2021. It boasts of 32 aeroplanes, out of which only 12 were active.

Arik Air is next in terms of market coverage. It earlier boasts of 11 aircraft out of 30 on its fleet before its takeover in 2017. Currently, it has five active aircraft in operation.