Little wonder, why foreign airlines including African carriers jostle to sign Bilateral Air Services Agreements (BASAs) with Nigeria’s government.
Prior to this time, many of the foreign airlines had described the Nigerian market as strategic to them in view of the constant load factors they enjoy all year round. In other words, Nigerians are always travelling.
It is again no news that while the foreign carriers smile to their home countries with huge profits generated from the Nigerian market based on the opportunities made available by the Nigerian government, reverse has continued to be the case with the indigenous airlines whose performances are not encouraging.
While most of the government policies have made the environment unfriendly for domestic airline business, no thanks to the expensive fuel price, unstable foreign exchange, multiple taxation among others, on the contrary, many policies of the government have surprisingly placed the foreign carriers over the indigenous airlines.
Such lopsided policies of government that are to the advantages of the foreign carriers but to the disadvantages of domestic airlines include: the multiple entry points, unlimited frequencies and the lopsided BASAs granted to the foreign carriers which many had described as some of the reasons hampering the progress of the domestic airlines.
The reasons behind the huge presence of the foreign airlines may not be far from the red carpets government often roll out for them when they come to Nigeria which are also extended to airlines from smaller African countries.
No one is begrudging the foreign airlines for the available opportunities, but, what is baffling amidst this is the failure of government to apply the same gesture towards making the same environment comfortable for its own domestic carriers.
At any given opportunity, government officials at the Ministry of Aviation and the aviation authorities always rush to claim that despite the designation of many domestic carriers on the foreign routes, that they have failed to perform, a position which has been discovered to be farther from the truth for so many reasons.
Without going too far, successful African carriers like Ethiopian, South African Airways and RwandAir would not have achieved so much without the backing of their home governments just as in countries like Europe and America, their governments are ever ready to engage in all manner of aero politics that will create enabling environment for their airlines or companies to operate profitably in any part of the world.
Any country that treats any airline from any of these foreign countries unjustly will instantly see the other side of their home governments which are ready to go into aero politics to protect their own. But the question is; can this be said of the Nigerian government? The answer is blowing in the wind.
While government continues to over-pamper airlines from the foreign countries including the sister African countries, it is no longer news to key players how most of the countries whose airlines are treated well here often treat Nigerian carriers designated to their countries shabbily.
The negative attitude of the African countries in particular negates such policies of integration of Africa, Yamoussoukro Declaration and the controversial African Continental Free Trade Area (AFCFTA) agreement they are mounting pressure on Nigeria to sign.
Some Nigerian carriers designated on these African countries have terrible tales to tell. Notorious for the hostility towards Nigerian carriers include Togo, Cote D’ivoire and South Africa.
Confirming the unjust treatment often meted to Nigerian carriers by these countries whose own airlines are being pampered in Nigeria, the Chairman of Air Peace, Mr. Allen Onyema narrated how aero politics had delayed his airline from commencing flight operations to the countries it has been designated to.
Citing how it took Senegal and South Africa two and half years to approve Air Peace operations into the country and respond to its application, Onyema challenged the Nigerian government to go the extra mile to leverage international aero politics to soften the ground for indigenous carriers, which he said could match legacy carriers with same service if a level playing field is created.
Without doubt, the time has come for the Nigerian government to come out of its shell by not only designating its airlines to foreign routes, but take part in aero politics for the purpose of protecting its own airlines.
and then