Posted by Sade Williams
The Federal government is already working on how it will have its slot system as part of measures to address some issues in the Bilateral Air Services Agreement (BASA).
This was disclosed by the Director general of the Nigerian Civil Authority (NCAA), Captain Musa Nuhu, in an interview recently.
The plan to have the slot system was muted against the backdrop of the imbroglio between the United Arabs Emirates (UAE) and Nigeria over refusal to grant requested slot to a Nigerian airline, Air Peace in Dubai as against the number frequencies granted Emirates airline in Nigeria.
According to Nuhu, Nigeria cannot hide under the issue of slots to give unfair commercial advantages to foreign airlines over Nigerian airlines.
“Believe me, we are working on that and it is going to be tit-for-tat. Let me use an example and I am not saying that is what we are going to do, but just as an example. If a Nigerian airline is going to United Kingdom and they insist Nigerian airline must buy slots, then any British Airlines that is coming into Nigeria will need to pay for slots too. It is tit-for-tat. If you tell me a particular airline from Nigeria cannot go to Heathrow because you cannot get slots, then, their airline too cannot come into Lagos because of slot issues. If you tell me a particular airline from Nigeria must pay for instance, 100,000 pounds to operate to Heathrow, then, their own airline will have to pay same amount of money to operate to Lagos. It is going to be reciprocity.
“We cannot hide under the issue of slots to give unfair commercial advantages to foreign airlines over Nigerian airlines. We had made mistakes in the past, we have learnt from our mistakes and we are going to correct the mistakes.
” Lagos Airport was built for less than 300,000 passengers in 1979 and the airport is doing more than 8 million passengers annually now and you are telling them your airport is doing above capacity, Lagos Airport is doing far above 1,000 per cent capacity. It is no longer acceptable. No one should come here and give us stories.”, he said.
Nuhu, who said the government needs to protect Nigerian businesses as Air Peace is one of the designated carriers from Nigeria, explained that everything that must happen between Nigeria and UAE under BASA must be official, adding that nothing will be respected on social media.
“Meanwhile, Emirates had stopped flying into Nigeria (at the time), yet we still gave them the 21 slots they requested for and here we are, we are asking for three and they are giving us stories.
” So, I reported to the minister and the minister said if they are willing to give us just one slot, we should give them only one slot, which was exactly what we did. That is justice. In UAE, we have the General Civil Aviation Authority (GCAA) and each of the Emirates has its own Civil Aviation Authority (CAA). Later, the Dubai CAA wrote to Air Peace and told the airline that it has seven slots reserved for it at Dubai Airport. So, the CEO of Air Peace, Mr. Allen Onyema, showed the letter to the Minister and we said Air Peace is designated to outside Nigeria based on the flight rules and Emirates is designated by the UAE Government under the BASA arrangement and we concluded that is what we are going to do. We told them to write to Nigeria officially.
“It is important to have all these officially. So, the Nigerian Government is ready to allow the operations start through the proper diplomatic channel. The Federal Ministry of Foreign Affairs has written to the Foreign Affairs of UAE to confirm officially if the letter was from them. Then, we will see where we go from there. It is important to have this fairness, transparent and equity.
” The government needs to protect Nigerian businesses and Air Peace is one of the designated carriers from Nigeria. If we allow other airlines to come and take all the juicy slots, we are shooting ourselves in the leg. They have said Air Peace can operate to UAE, but we want it to be made available to us officially. Once this is done, their airline can resume operations as they requested.”, he added.
