The Senate has overwhelmingly condemned the outrageous fares being charged by local airline operators over the past few weeks, forcing the upper legislative chamber to investigate the trend.
During a debate on the matter at plenary on Tuesday, some of the lawmakers said they witnessed where some of the airlines charged as high as N500,000 and N650,000 for one-way tickets, instead of the N150,000 or N250,000 charged on a normal day.
The debate was sequel to a motion, moved by the chairman of the Senate Committee on Aviation, Senator Abdulfatai Buhari, who described the exorbitant hike as unacceptable and called on the Senate to intervene.
“In the last three months, Nigerians have been complaining about the outrageous air fares being charged by the airlines. Based on their complaints, we had an informal interaction with the airline owners operators demanding for explanations.
“But nothing came out of the interaction because it was an informal one. So there is a need for the Senate to intervene by inviting all the stakeholders in the aviation sector with a view to addressing the problem,” Senator Buhari said.
The Oyo senator further noted that some of the airlines have raised their Lagos to Abuja fares to as high as N500, 000 and N650, 000 for just one way ticket.
Corroborating Buhari’s position, Senator Adamu Aliero said the charges by the airlines are, to say the least, outrageous, nothing that minimum wage earners would have to save five months salaries just to purchase a one way flight ticket on any route.
Aliero said the hike in fares cannot be justified, pointing out that there was no corresponding increase in the price of aviation fuel or airport charges.
The Kebbi senator further argued that it’s expected that airlines would effect marginal increase in their fares during festive seasons, but decried what he described as the current prohibitive charges by the airlines.
Similarly, Senator Onyekachi Nwaebonyi narrated his personal encounter with one of the airlines earlier on Tuesday morning.
Nwaebonyi said, “Just this morning, I asked my personal assistant to book a flight for me, from Abuja to Enugu for 13th December. But he told me that Air Peace demanded for N500, 000 while Ibom Air charged N450, 000 for the same flight.”
The Ebonyi senator and a few other senators were forced to re-open the Air Nigeria project, which was initiated during the Mohammadu Buhari administration but which has yet to take off.
“When are we going to have Air Nigeria because we all know about Ghana Air and other airlines owned by other African countries which are still being managed effectively. We must save Nigerians from this extortion by local airlines,” Nwaebonyi said.
Also, Senator Olamilekan Adeola questioned the rationale behind the increase in fares, saying that he was fully aware of certain concessions granted by the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) to the airline operators in foreign exchange transactions.
He dismissed arguments being raised in certain quarters that the high cost of spare parts was eating into the finances of the airlines. According to him, “nobody asked them to purchase aircraft that are as old as 30 years and above.”
Adeola consequently agreed with the motion calling for investigation of the matter and summons to the operators and other stakeholders for questioning.
Some of those billed to appear before the Senate Aviation committee in the days ahead, include the Aviation Minister and heads of the Federal Airport Authority of Nigeria (FAAN), Nigerian Civil Aviation Authority (NCAA) among others.
During the debate, Senator Orji Uzor Kalu (Abia North) attempted to justify the hike in air fares, citing rising operational costs.
But his voice was drowned by shouts of “No” “No” “No” by almost all other senators at plenary.
Before ruling on the motion to invite the aviation stakeholders, the President of the Senate, Godswill Akpabio, aligned with the senators on the need to call the airline operators to order.
Akpabio agreed that Nigerian air travelers are being exploited by the airlines operators, noting that the situation would have been different if Nigeria Air was to be in operation.
“Yes. I agree that Nigeria Air would have been sympathetic to Nigerian air travelers with lower fares. This would have forced the private operators to lower their prices,” he said.
The Senate Aviation committee was subsequently directed to work towards inviting the stakeholders for discussion in the shortest possible time, before the Senate proceeds on its Christmas and end-of-the-year break in two weeks’ time.
