Lufthansa and Royal Air Maroc have respectively signed ground handling contracts with the Nigerian Aviation Handling Company Plc (nahcoaviance) for the next five years.
Spokesman for the firm, Mr Tayo Ajakaye, said in a statement that the contract with Lufthansa runs from May 1, 2024, through April 30, 2029, while the deal with Royal Air Maroc is a comprehensive one, for both Lagos and Abuja destinations.
He said the Royal Air Maroc – Lagos – Abuja deal will operate from May 01, 2024, through April 30, 2029 as well.
The statement quoted the nahcoaviance’ group executive director, commercial and business development, Mr Saheed Lasisi as saying that the new contracts were coming at a time when the company “is massively increasing its capacity with the recent purchase of new ground support equipment.
“Lufthansa and Royal Air Maroc have made the right decision in staying with NAHCO, evidently the largest handling provider in the country. We just took delivery of billions of naira worth of equipment which would be deployed to service these valued partners. It is a thrilling development,” he said.
The company’s group managing director and chief executive officer, Mr Indranil Gupta, the new deals affirmed that “it is great partnerships at work,” and assured the two carriers of exceptional service delivery.
“We are always happy to serve clients who depend on us to further grow their businesses. We will always go the extra mile to ensure that we support them to keep their promises to their clients to offer the best service,” he said.
Gupta noted that the company was doing a lot in the area of manpower development and equipment purchase in order to be able to give incomparable service.
He said the company had announced the deployment of several equipment recently purchased to some of its stations.
The deployed equipment comprised several units of push backs, ground power units, aircraft cooling units, aircraft air start units, tractors, reach trucks, forklifts, cargo and baggage carts, and pallet dollies.
He said the deployment would be the first in a series of massive equipment replacement embarked upon by the nahcoaviance which had set for itself an ambitious target of excess ground support equipment in two years.
Founded in December 1979 by the federal government through the Federal Airports Authority of Nigeria (FAAN) in collaboration with four international airlines – Air France, British Airways, Lufthansa and Sabena – nahcoaviance is now a publicly quoted company listed on the NGX.
The company is now a multi-billion naira institution with diversified investments in energy, logistics, a free trade zone company, airport management, travel and hospitality and food and beverage export.
Currently, it has three institutional investors holding more than 5% of its total shares as of December 31, 2023.
The major investors are Godsmart Nigeria Limited, 26.95%; White Cowries Industries Limited, 9.16% and Awhua Resources Limited – 7.13%.
NAHCO grossed revenue of N28.4 billion naira in the financial year 2023.
