Airfare Hike Imminent As Air Peace Suspends Flight To Dubai

LAGOS – There is palpable fear that airfares on the United Arab Emirates (UAE) routes may skyrocket following the sus­pension of flight services to the Middle East country by the only Nigerian airline flying the route, Air Peace.

Emirates, the flag carrier of UAE, had on October 29, 2022, suspended flight ser­vices from its base in Dubai to its routes in Nigeria, cit­ing its inability to repatriate its trapped funds out of the country.

On Monday, Air Peace in a statement by Stanley Oli­sa, its spokesman, said the airline is suspending flights to Dubai following the deci­sion of the UAE government not to issue Nigerians entry visas to its country.

Olisa on Monday after­noon said the airline sus­pended its direct flights to UAE till further notice due to the non-issuance of entry visas to Nigerians.

The airline said that the suspension of its three week­ly flights to UAE would take effect from Tuesday, Novem­ber 22, 2022.The statement said: “This is consequent upon the per­sisting non-issuance of vi­sas to Nigerian travellers by the government of the United Arab Emirates and the accompanying inconve­niences.

“Air Peace has been op­erating into UAE even with the country’s recent travel restrictions, but given the heightening hurdles Nige­rian travellers are facing in accessing the country, it has become imperative that we halt our operations to that destination.”

Olisa said that its man­agement would provide fur­ther updates as the situation progresses.

The airline said that pas­sengers whose flights are af­fected by this development could email its Call Center Team to attend to their con­cerns.With this, there is no lon­ger direct flight between Ni­geria and UAE.

Etihad, the national car­rier of UAE, operates flight services to Abu Dhabi, but its service to Nigeria has been inconsistent in recent times.

The suspension of the Dubai routes by Air Peace and Emirates would offer airlines like Qatar Airways, Turkish, Ethiopian Airlines and others to hike their air­fares for Nigerian travellersAlready, a return ticket in the economy class of Emir­ates Airlines to Dubai was oscillating between N800,000 and N1.2 million before the airline suspended flights to Nigeria, while Air Peace was between N400,000 and N700, 000, depending on the time the flight was booked.

Mr. Chris Amokwu, avia­tion analyst, said the suspen­sion of flights by Air Peace would further compound the woes of the flying public.

Amokwu stated that the loss of the two airlines would be the gain of other Middle East carriers, stressing that the two airlines, Emirates and Air Peace, controlled over 90 percent of flights to Dubai.

According to him, other airlines flying the routes would increase fares for travellers.

Before the suspension, Emirates was flying 21 fre­quencies to Lagos and Abu­ja weekly, while Air Peace flies three weekly flights to the route.