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Louis Ibah
Scoes of air travellers were left stranded at some Nigerian airports at the weekend as the local airline industry struggled to meet demand for air travels owing to lack of capacity in aircraft fleet capacity to meet the surge in human traffic due to the Easter holidays.
The crisis of fewer air- craft chasing more passengers also saw airfares rise by more than 50 per cent on some routes, notably Port Harcourt, Kano, Kaduna, Enugu, Uyo, Owerri, Jos, Lagos, and Abuja where fares rose from an average of N22,000 to N45,000.
Worst hit among the stranded passengers were Nigerians returning from overseas who targeted purchasing tickets on arrival in the country.
Daily Sun visited the local terminals of the Murtala Muhammed Airport (MMA) Lagos on good Friday and Saturday where some passengers complained of their inability to find connecting flights to some eastern routes and had to opt to fly the following days.
“It’s a very frustrating experience; no flights avail- able for me and my family,” said a passenger who gave his name as Paulinus.
“I came in from the US through London and I can’t get a flight to Enugu today (Saturday) and am told to fly on Easter Sun- day instead. I tried to book online severally last week but couldn’t find a seat and when I called home I was assured I will get options once I get to the local air- port. Sadly, am stranded here,” he added.
Indeed majority of Nigeria’s local airlines have seen their fleet depleted in recent years given their poorly capitalised base and the crisis of sourcing for forex to acquire or lease new aircraft. Local airlines like Arik Air, Medview Airlines, Dana Air, and Aero Con- tractors have been unable to grow their fleet to match rising passenger demand during yuletide and other festive seasons like Easter .
Spokespersons for Dana Air and Air Peace, Mr. Kingsley Ezewa and Christian Iwarah respectively however told Daily Sun that the rise in passenger traffic was only witnessed on some routes and that what most of the airlines did was to create additional flights on those routes.
“The rush is expected and we have created additional flights on the routes we envisage an extra demand so that passengers don’t have issues and are also not stranded,” Ezenwa said.
“Because our fares are very competitive comparatively our flights are all fully booked this easter,” he added.
Iwarah who bemoaned the rising cost of operating a flight in recent years in Nigeria said the airline had challenges managing rising passenger demand with supply as well as keep- ing fares low or affordable.
“Traffic during festivities moves towards some destinations depending on the event,” said Iwarah.
“Air fares are however dynamic. You have different classes of fares, ranging from the lowest to the high- est. The implication of the fare structure is that those who book early enough get the cheapest class of fares available.What that means is that you may operate a full flight to the destination and return sometimes with an empty flight or a very low passenger load.
“Because of the high demand for air travel to certain destinations during the Easter celebrations, the lowest fares were quickly exhausted. What we then did was to schedule more flights to such destinations to ensure a lot more travellers had access to cheap tickets. Easter is all about sacrifice and we have no inhibitions at all demonstrating this spirit in our flight business despite the huge financial implications for us,” Iwarah added.
