Middle Eastern Airline, Emirates has confirmed that it will suspend its Abuja-Dubai flight operations starting from October 30, 2016.
The airline will now only fly out of Lagos cutting its Nigerian flight frequency from 21 times a week to about 5 times a week.
According to reports, the airline blames the decision on challenges with “foreign exchange, low patronage, and other operational issues, which have reduced the profitability of flying on the route”.
A few months ago, United Airlines, Iberia also stopped operations in Nigeria blaming operational and forex related issues. We also learnt that Egypt Air has also stopped operations in Nigeria while Kenya Airways is set to suspend its Abuja route.
The airline Industry operates on very thin margins making repatriation of their earnings a serious impoundment to flight operations.
Industry analysts also inform Nairametrics that the poor state of the Abuja Runway is also a contributory factor to the decision by most airlines to pull out of the Federal Capital.
