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…Enables single-ticket travel
By Chinelo Obogo
United Nigeria Airlines has been officially admitted into the International Air Transport Association’s Multilateral Interline Traffic Agreement (MITA) following confirmation through IATA’s Memorandum ADMIN/INTERLINE/4811.
One of the most immediate gains of this development is that Nigeria now has an airline capable of functioning as a connecting hub carrier. Until now, international passengers flying into Nigeria on carriers like Emirates, Qatar Airways, or British Airways had no way to continue their journey to other states like Anambra, Enugu, Delta, Owerri or Bayelsa on a single ticket. But with MITA membership, United Nigeria Airlines can now formally interline with those global carriers, meaning a passenger booking London to Enugu can do so on one ticket, one baggage check-in, and with coordinated connections.
The admission, which follows the airline’s compliance with PSC Resolution 780, makes United Nigeria Airlines the latest African carrier to gain access to a global platform that connects hundreds of airlines across the world. MITA is the framework through which airlines worldwide agree to sell each other’s seats, coordinate baggage across carriers, and honour connections on a single unified ticket. With this development, United Nigeria Airlines can now negotiate interline and codeshare partnerships with hundreds of IATA-member carriers across the world. A passenger for instance, can check in from New York and arrive in Abuja after two connecting flights on different carriers.
Tourism industry to get a boost
Without a MITA-compliant domestic carrier capable of interlining with international airlines, packaging Nigeria as a multi-city tourist destination was impossible within standard global travel booking systems but that constraint has now been lifted. Travel agencies and tour operators around the world can now curate packages that can bring in tourists from anywhere in the world into Lagos and Abuja and onward to any Nigerian destinations on a single booking.
To be a MITA member requires very strict compliance with IATA’s passenger service standards, financial settlement procedures, and operational documentation requirements and any airline that meets these standards sends signals to foreign airlines, aircraft lessors, and international insurers that it has credibility and it would have a positive effect on the country’s aviation.
The announcement also helps Nigeria’s ambition of developing Lagos or Abuja into a major regional aviation hub for West Africa. Aviation hubs depend on airlines being able to seamlessly move passengers between international and domestic flights and this is what MITA does. With a domestic carrier now part of the global interline framework, Nigeria is better placed to make a credible push for a share of West Africa’s transit traffic. However, Nigeria’s aviation sector is still grappling with high fuel costs, multiple taxation and other infrastructural issues will not be resolved by a single membership agreement.
