The authorities of the United Arab Emirates (UAE) reportedly announced suspending travel ban on Nigeria and 11 other African countries but the director general of the Nigerian Civil Aviation Authority (NCAA), Capt Musa Nuhu says in an interview that the Arab country’s civil aviation authority has not communicated officially to Nigeria about such development.
Ime Akpan
UAE communicating via unrecognised channel
The country manager of Emirates Airlines came to my office and he submitted a letter by Dubai Airport lifting the ban on Nigeria and 11 other African countries. Of course, we still have some protocols that have to be complied with. I think it is acceptable.
But what I told him is that the issue of flight operations between Nigeria and UAE is based on BASA. Nigeria as a government, we don’t deal with an airline, we deal with the authorities of UAE. So, what I told him is that the civil aviation authority of UAE should write to us officially through diplomatic channels. When we have that, it means the Nigerian Government is in official communication with UAE. As soon as that letter comes in, I’m sure it is going to come…we will act on it.
Officially, we are not aware because I need the UAE CAA to officially inform me through government to government channels. So, when we get that it becomes official.
Emirates resuming services to Nigeria
When we receive their letter, then the federal government will have to take a decision on that. We have the ministry of aviation, which deals with matters of policies and also, we have the presidential steering committee on Covid-19. However, we don’t think it will take time to take a decision once we receive the letter officially.
On stringent measures taken before Air Peace could fly into Dubai Airport
I am not so sure of the measures you are talking about. But we cannot choose for Air Peace whether it’s Dubai or Sharjah it wants to fly into. It depends on the airline to choose the airport it wants to fly into and the approval given by the UAE government based on our BASA arrangement with them.
We will support Air Peace and if Air Peace is having some issues there, we will see how we can help with the authorities there too so that they won’t have any problem and the airline can resume flight services to the airport.
Air Peace is a Nigerian carrier and it is our responsibility to ensure that they get any support we can give them like any other Nigerian carrier. We see a lot of countries that their airlines come here and how their governments support them.
For instance, when United Airlines wanted to resume flight services to Nigeria, the American government supported them through their embassy in Nigeria. Everybody is supporting its own and we should support our own airlines.
On restriction of Emirates Airlines to Abuja airport alone
The whole idea was because they didn’t give Air Peace what it requested for. Air Peace requested for three frequencies and they gave it just one and the reason they gave was that Sharjah airport was overstretched. Believe you me; there is nobody that will tell you its airport is operating above capacity at the moment.
But, if you look at Lagos Airport now, it is operating at above capacity. Lagos was launched in 1978 or 1979. How many people were travelling then and how many people are travelling now? If there is any airport that is operating above capacity it is Lagos Airport. But now, they said they have given Air Peace the slots it said it wanted and we have given them same back.
