Yemisi Izuora
The Chairman of Air Peace; Chief Allen Onyema has raised concern over taxes paid by operators and called for the review of over 34 taxes levied on airlines, saying that failure to rectify it would lead to the collapse of more airlines.
He also flayed high cost aviation fuel which he put at N215 per liter saying that it consumes 75 per cent of airlines’ revenue.
The NCAA had recently disclosed that out of 150 airlines, only eight are surviving; a situation that exposed the danger airlines are faced in the country and the high rate of extinction.
Meanwhile, Airline operators have called on the Nigeria civil Aviation Authority (NCAA), to ensure protection of airline staff in the hands of aggrieved passengers whose flights are rescheduled or outrightly cancelled without informing the already tensed travellers.
There has been a prevalence of assault on line workers lately with three incidents recorded in the last one week. The latest was one involving Air Peace ground staff who was beaten to coma before aviation security operatives came to his rescue.
Last Saturday, another case of assault was recorded when an Arik staff was seriously beaten by irate passengers which led to pandemonium at the General Aviation Terminal (GAT) of the Murtala Muhammed Airport.
Onyema at a press briefing at the airline’s head office at Ikeja GRA, Lagos said the airline had had to cope with challenges of having three of its aircraft grounded as a result of two of them clipping each other’s wing and the raming into one of its airplane a truck belonging to Skypower Aviation Handing company Limited (SAHCOL).
Onyema stated that the grounding of three aircraft at the same time, stressing that the carrier has lost about N3b since the incident as they were unable to operate the planes aside the $650, 000 it would cost to fix the winglets of the two damaged planes.
The airline also took a swipe at countries, especially Togo and Cote D’Ivoire who he accused of stopping many Nigerian carriers from reciprocating liberalization of air transport services into their countries.
He threatened to sue Togo if by May 23, 2017 the country fail to rescind the strict conditions that allow Air Peace or any other Nigeria airline to operate to Lome, describing their actions as stifling competition and movement of trade.
Onyema who also spoke on various issues affecting the sector, especially on vexed multiple taxations, saying more carriers would go under if huge taxes are not reviewed or reduced.
According to him, We want to support this government to succeed. The Minister for State for Aviation, Hadi Sirika means well. He just needs good advice. What we are saying is that more airlines would crumble if these taxes were not reviewed. Some of these taxes are fall out of legislation. Government needs to check why airlines are crumbling.