Nigeria aviation hub effort stymied by poor infrastructure

Nigeria’s potential to become an aviation hub for Africa, using its natural advantages such as its central location on the continent, huge population and a growing middle class, is being stymied by poor aviation infrastructure and lethargy from a government which urgently needs to diversify its economy away from oil.

Experts say establishing Nigeria as a regional aviation hub would move it one step way from dependence on oil and result in the creation of economic activity that would spin-off jobs and attract revenue, even beyond the aviation sector.

Aviation hubs are airports which an airline or a region uses as a transfer point to get passengers to their intended destinations. They are aviation crossroads and are attractive because of the frequency of flights to a wide array of destinations from there.

Major global aircraft manufacturer, US Boeing, had in 2012 started preliminary discussion with Nigeria’s Federal Ministry of Aviation towards an agreement to develop the country into a regional aviation hub, and reposition the sector as the reference point on all aviation matters in Africa. 

Boeing stated that the requirements for attaining the goal, included the enhancement and sustenance the nation’s aviation safety record, as well as establishing Maintenance and Repair Organisations (MROs) in the country.

Also required, it said, was the establishment of a Training Hub in Nigeria, along with technical assessments of all aircraft operated by domestic airlines in the country and a fleet renewal and acquisition programme for the airlines. 

Boeing further said it was necessary to develop an aviation database and Integrated Air Navigation Systems, Optimisation System Support for Airports and Airlines, as well as assess existing spare-parts and material marts in Nigeria, with a view to proposing a business partnership case for the establishment of an integrated spare parts super market in the country. 

Boeing, whose team was led by Lawrence Polliver, Director of Sales (Africa), expressed satisfaction with the ministry’s roadmap for the revival of the aviation industry at that time, and declared its readiness to collaborate on the 8-Point programme of action for the repositioning of the sector as the aviation hub on the continent.

There was apparently no meaningful follow-up on this discussion.

Lagos, Nigeria’s commercial capital, which houses the country’s major aviation agencies, remains the choice destination for all international carriers and commands the highest traffic in and out of the country.

Nogie Meggison, Executive Chairman, Airline Operators of Nigeria (AON), told BusinessDay that Nigeria’s natural advantages alone cannot make it become a hub; rather it needs strong airlines that could distribute passengers from Europe, the Americas, Asia and other destinations outside the continent to various parts of Africa, when they arrive at the airport which operates as hub.

“At the Murtala Muhammed Airport, there are no amenities for transit passengers. So, passengers will not want to spend money to transit from Nigeria. Rather, they transit Dubai, where there is accommodation, free food and music among others,” he explained.

Meggison added that there is an urgent need to upgrade airport runways, lights and terminals. Citing an example of Dubai, Meggison noted that Dubai leveraged its geographic location to become a natural hub between the East and the West. “If Nigeria becomes a hub for Africa, that will mean more taxes from food, hotels and landing charges from airlines. Aviation is not airline only; there is a service that goes to it,” Meggison said.

Other experts say that the advantages that accrue from being a hub include revenues from payment of landing and parking fees, servicing of aircrafts, airport taxes, business for the hospitality and transport sector, amongst others.

Girma Wake, Former Managing Director of Ethiopian Airlines, said that the whole of Africa is waiting for Nigeria to get things right in aviation, the first step to achieve this is to develop a hub for West Africa.

He also said the sub-region needs maintenance, repair and overhaul (MRO) facility and the natural place that such facility should be established, is in Nigeria.

OR Tambo International, now called Johannesburg International Airport is recorded as the largest and busiest airport in Africa, with about 28 million passengers passing through its terminals every year. Cairo International Airport, handles more than 13 million passengers every year, making it the second busiest Airport in Africa.

Cape Town International Airport is another South African Airport with more than eight million passengers every year. However, the Murtala Muhammed International Airport, MMA1, located in Lagos is the busiest in West Africa, with over six million travellers passing through its gates every year.

All Nigerian airports processed about 15 million air travellers in 2015.

Saleh Dunoma, Managing Director of the Federal Airports Authority of Nigeria (FAAN), said that the new terminals being built at Nigeria’s major international airports in Lagos, Abuja, Kano, Port-Harcourt and Enugu, will make Nigeria the hub of aviation in Africa, when completed in 2016.

Dunoma said the completion of these terminals would stimulate robust growth in passenger and cargo traffic.

According to him, “These airports will improve passenger comfort, increase capacity and improve facilitation.”

Chris Aligbe, an aviation expert, said though Nigeria is endowed with good geographical location, it is not enough to make her airports natural hubs, as hub development goes beyond geography to strong carriers to distribute passengers.

Aligbe said other countries in Africa are using their carriers to develop their airports into strong hubs for the distribution of passengers on the airline network they belong to, adding that until government designs policies that will promote strong indigenous carriers, the ambition to develop some airports into a hub would remain a dream.

“The kind of multiplier effect a hub has in economic development in any country is huge. We are not in a position to develop that now, because we do not have strong domestic carriers as flag carrier that can do this. “Nigeria has ten domestic airlines which provide 6,538 seats to the travelling public daily.”

The airlines include Arik Air, Medview, Aero, First Nation, Discovery Air, Air Peace, Azman Air and Overland.

Nigeria has 26 airports but only five of the airports are aThe more active ones include the Nnamdi Azikiwe International Airport, Abuja, Akanu Ibiam International Airport, Enugu, Mallam Aminu Kano International Airport, Kano, Murtala Muhammed International Airport, Lagos and Port Harcourt International Airport, Port Harcourt.

IFEOMA OKEKE