All Emirates flights to Nigeria will be suspended

The carrier will suspend all fights to Nigeria beginning September.

As announced by the airline, all Nigerian operations will be on hold due to “no progress” in the attempts of obtaining the company’s funds currently blocked in the West African country.

"Emirates has tried every avenue to address our ongoing challenges in repatriating funds from Nigeria and have made considerable efforts to initiate dialogue with the relevant authorities for their urgent intervention to help find a viable solution. Regrettable there has been no progress," the company stated.

The carrier declared that it has difficulties accessing $85 million withheld in the country, a sum that increases by $10 million each month. Due to this inconvenient, Emirates switched from reducing flights to Lagos to suspending all operations to this destination until the situation will be solved.

Nigeria's Aviation Minister, Hadi Sirika, also commented on the matter:

"In the past, Nigeria has demonstrated the capacity and the willingness and fairness to resolve this type of issue. It happened when we took over power in 2015: There were lots of blocked funds, about $600 million at that time. It was at a time when the country was in a recession and there were dwindling revenues coming to the country, yet we honoured our obligation to pay out all those blocked funds. [...]

"Unfortunately, due to many factors and reasons, the monies piled back up. Government is working hard to ensure that these monies are released, not only for Emirates but all airlines affected.”

At the same time, Minister Sirika said that Nigerian officials aim to let their commercial partners know that "mechanisms will be put in place to ensure that this does not occur in the future."

Nigeria is currently struggling with shortages in foreign exchange translating into a restricted access to pay for imports, while local currency is free-falling. For example, according to data from the International Air Transport Association, the country, which is one of the biggest market for international carriers on the continent, has to refund foreign airlines operating on its territory some $450 million.

 

Source: edition.cnn.com