As the yuletide season approaches, air passengers travelling to the South Eastern part of Nigeria are confronted with sky-high ticket prices, surpassing N500,000 for return trips.
While routes like Lagos-Abuja, Lagos-Port Harcourt, and Lagos-Uyo have maintained pre-yuletide fares, airfares to South Eastern destinations have surged significantly.
Monitoring various airlines, it was observed that return tickets from Lagos to Anambra on Air Peace are priced at N533,600. Similarly, Lagos-Enugu and Lagos-Owerri return tickets are at N343,200 and N533,600, respectively.
United Nigeria Airlines charges N441,000 for Abuja-Anambra return trips, while Lagos-Anambra, Lagos-Enugu, and Lagos-Owerri tickets cost N520,500, N441,000, and N520,500, respectively.
Dana Air, which solely services Owerri in the Southeast, offers return tickets during this period for N400,000.
Despite the exorbitant prices, airlines have reportedly sold out their seats for the festive season.
The surge in airfares has been attributed to factors such as inflation, foreign exchange fluctuations, airlines facing trapped funds, and soaring costs of jet A1.
During peak periods like yuletide, travellers opt for expensive airfares due to insecurity, preferring air travel over land transportation.
Speaking on this, Olumide Ohunayo, Secretary General of the Aviation Round Table Initiative (ARTI), noted that current exchange rates justified the escalated fares.
He emphasized that ticket prices globally are influenced by demand and timing of purchase, and Nigeria’s domestic market adheres to similar principles.
However, Ohunayo predicted a return to average fares by January, highlighting the need for airlines to secure more aircraft leases to meet high demands during the season.
His words: “The airfare is justified because we are in the festive season and any passengers who didn’t buy a ticket three months ago will pay the N350,000 one way fare.
“The same aircraft, some passengers will pay N80,000, N100,000 because they have planned their travel ahead. If you are travelling anywhere in the world at this period, the ticket goes up astronomically.
“Aviation products are always in dollars and Nigerian airlines earn in Naira, however, with the current exchange rate, the airfare we are seeing now is not unexpected.
“What we can encourage is to see if we can have more airlines or the fewer airlines available can get wet lease aircraft to augment high demands during this season.”
Supporting this sentiment, the former commandant of Murtala Mohammed International Airport, Group Captain John Ojikutu (rtd), attributed the increased fares to the depreciation of the Naira against the Dollar and the quadrupled cost of aviation fuel.
Ojikutu advised the government to categorize airports based on passenger traffic and enforce operators to deposit forex charges into a central bank account, ensuring transactions are in Naira equivalents.
“The dollar rate against the naira is about thrice what it was about 12 months ago so also is the cost of aviation fuel four times what it was six months ago so should you expect the air fares not to be less than thrice what it was six months ago?
“Note that costing of aviation services is globally rated against the Dollar and should justifiably reflect the Economic reality,” he noted.
