Emirates Airlines has announced that it will reduce the number of flights to Nigeria starting August 15th, 2022 due to failure to repatriate its revenue from Nigeria. The airline disclosed this in a letter dated July 22nd, 2022 and was addressed to Nigeria’s Minister of Aviation, Hadi Sirika, and signed by the airline’s DSVP International Affairs, Majid Al Mualla. The letter read in part, “With effect from August 15th, 2022, Emirates will be forced to reduce flights from Dubai to Lagos from 11 per week to 7 per week. We have had no choice but to take this action to mitigate the continued losses Emirates is experiencing as a result of funds being blocked in Nigeria.”
The letter noted that as of July, Emirates had over $85 million awaiting repatriation from the country. The airline said that the figure has been rising by more than $10 million every month. Meanwhile, operational costs of 11 weekly flights to Lagos and 5 to Abuja continue to accumulate. The airline said that these funds are urgently needed to meet operational costs and maintain the commercial viability of their services to Nigeria. “We simply cannot continue to operate at the current level in the face of mounting losses, especially in the challenging post-COVID-19 climate,” it said.
Businesses in Nigeria are increasingly having problem with forex.
In the wake of dollar scarcity in Nigeria, businesses are increasingly having difficulty sourcing forex to buy goods and pay for services overseas, especially businesses that survive on importing raw materials and essential commodities. Because of this, these businesses that depend on the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) to get dollars for their imports have either folded up or encountered great difficulty in conducting their business. For instance, Nigerian students studying abroad are encountering bottlenecks in paying their tuition fees in dollars, pounds, and other foreign currencies, while associations such as the Association of Master Bakers and Caterers of Nigeria have also said that dollar scarcity has affected their members too.
The Central Bank of Nigeria has tried several measures in hopes that they will mitigate this problem. The CBN stopped the receipt of funds in foreign currencies to a normal savings account because the funds will be converted to naira. Another measure that the CBN took was to make the exchange of naira into dollar not easy except through a domiciliary account. As the days go by and the country’s foreign reserve continues to deplete, foreign businesses such as Emirates Airlines now find it difficult to repatriate their revenue from the country.
Emirates’ proposal to pay for fuel in naira rejected by supplier.
According to the Bilateral Air Service Agreements (BASAs) with countries, airline tickets are mostly sold in naira while the airlines would repatriate the funds in dollars through the CBN. Emirates said it tried to stem the losses by proposing to pay for fuel in Nigeria in naira. This would have at least reduced one element of its costs, but the request was denied by the supplier. The airline said, “This means that not only are Emirates’ revenues accumulating, we also have to send hard currency into Nigeria to sustain our own operation. Meanwhile, our revenues are out of reach and not even earning credit interest.”
They continued, “This is not a decision we have taken lightly. Indeed, we have made every effort to work with the Central Bank of Nigeria to find a solution to this issue. Our Senior Vice President met with the Deputy Governor of the CBN in May and followed up on the meeting by letter to the governor himself the following month. However, no positive response was received.” The letter also explained that meetings were also held with Emirates Bank in Nigeria and in collaboration with the International Air Transport Association (IATA) to discuss improving Forex allocation but with limited success.
The airline has requested that the government help.
The airline has requested that the government help resolve the problem. Presently, Nigeria faces a foreign currency crunch amidst low oil revenue and increasing demand for dollars – which has resulted into the dollar being sold for 710 naira on July 29th, 2022 at the parallel market. This is the worst performance of Nigeria’s naira in the exchange market. “Should there be any positive development in the coming days, we will of course re-evaluate this decision,” the airline said.
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Nigeria my country is a real cruise different news daily Emirates reducing it’s number of flight weekly,how did we dgt to this juncture because of scarcity of dollars and several people are suffering international businesses,foreign students and others,and there funs being blocked in Nigeria….. something should be done haba
It only gets worse by the day. Why are they denied access to their funds? Clearly they need them to cover operational cost as they already stated. The country is really in shambles; businesses depending on import are struggling. How long do we have to do this for?
Thing needs to done thing are getting out of hand due to high cost of things, there is increasement in dollar as make everything high, now the emirates airline to reduce the fight in nigeria which will affect alot of foreign operation. Solution need to be done so everything can balance
Well the Emirates have no choice. They can’t be operating at a loss, so in their discretion they will reduce the amount of airline into Nigeria. Everything about Nigeria has gone up, it is quite distasteful that international airlines can’t operate properly now. I hope the government will do something about it.
😂 this country is something else. Everything bad is increasing in Nigeria. That is their decision with reason to reduce Emirates flight to Nigeria. It is well jara
The issue here is not just about the money but also the integrity of the country Nigeria. Emirates airline is losing if they continue to operate at the level. Nigeria government has done little to nothing to change this outcome. This is another failure of this Buhari government that will deprived the citizens freedom of travel at their convenience.
Emirate actions are justifiable considering the fact they are denied to repatriate its revenue from Nigeria. Nigeria governments needs to intervene and find an effective measure to resolve this issue of our currency value decreasing day by day.
To change this outcome, our government has done very little to nothing. This is yet another oversight by the current administration that could pose problems for frequent flyers of this airline.
The US economy has entered recession this has made US dollars difficult to get. Now we are feeling the effect in Nigeria. Emirates airlines couldn’t continue with their regular number of flight due to dollar scarcity. These are the kinds of things that happens to a country that only consume and refusing to produce. CBN should come to terms with the Emirates airlines to make it ease for the airline to do business in Nigeria.
Why should the government be blocking this airline from receiving funds because dollars is scares. Doing the last primary APC election the presidential aspirant where distributing dollars nobody stopped them. All these shows that our government is so confuse and doesn’t know what to do on how to run the economy of the country. Many companies are already folding up because of government policies, increased interest rate, and the inflation in the country. The government should find solutions to this hilarious situation of the country.
Things in Nigeria has gone up and if the emirates airline continue to operate at this level it will ruin them due to this cause, they can’t operate properly as expected… I hope the government will do something about it… ASAP
How can the government refuse to repatriate revenue generated by emirate airline ? The exchange rate is one thing affecting businesses right now and now the government is making it worse for Emirates by not repatriating their revenue. This is just another means of tarnishing the image of this country
I wouldn’t blame emirate for making this decision. This clearly shows how low how government can go, it’s just sad that they are showing off there incompetency to a foreign country
I wouldn’t be surprised if Emirates stops operating in Nigeria and if they do It will be justifiable because I don’t know how boo it government expect them to operate without funds. How will they finance their operations?
It’s just sad that our government is giving foreign countries bad impression about us, Emirates reducing flights will mostly affect those that go to Dubai to buy goods, I hope the government will work on this bad repartriate all the revenue back to emirate
This is not a bad move from Emirates because they are incurring more losses than profits from their flight to Nigeria and it is dealing more damage to them.
This will just keep spoiling our reputation to the outside world and they won’t want to be engaging in business with us.
It’s just obvious that our government has lost control of the economy and the citizens are the ones paying the cost.
Emirates trying to reduce flights from Dubai to Lagos from 11 per week to 7 per week is hilarious.
Although their action is justifiable because naira has lost its place, however, such action will only add to the problem on the ground.
We are not supposed to be behaving like this at all, plus this is even a big and respectable airline in the world. Really sad
The government should quickly step in and look for ways to resolve this issue because it doesn’t pose a good look for us as a country.
The cash are urgently required in order to cover the operational costs of the Emirates airline; if they are not reached, the company may be forced to declare bankruptcy, so I understand why they are taking this step.
The issue of sourcing for Forex for the people importing goods that can’t be produce in Nigeria is really getting hard urgent intervention should be initiate so that it wouldn’t affect masses much because lots of industries are folding up each.
The CBN should work on this dollar scarcity issue so that people can patronize these people better and things can go back to normal.
Because there was a shortage of dollars, Emirates Airlines was unable to maintain their usual number of flights so it’s not really their fault.
The Emirates, though, have no other option. They can’t afford to run a business at a loss; therefore, they’ve decided to cut back on the number of flights into Nigeria at their discretion. Everything about Nigeria has become more expensive, and it is disappointing that international airlines cannot operate normally. I hope that something will be done about it by the government.