Q1 2025: Delays, cancellations still set aviation backward

The aviation industry in first quarter 2025 has not done too badly, but the twin monsters of flight delays and cancellations including high number of lost baggage which continued unabated, have continued to put the sector in a very precarious situation, writes, WOLE SHADARE

Slow start

The aviation industry in first quarter 2025 started rather slowly for obvious reasons. It is expected that after the last quarter of the previous year, the next quarter in aviation or the first quarter in of every year begins slowly in a snail-like speed.

The year began with the Minister of Aviation and Aerospace Development, Mr. Festus Keyamo scooping many awards for what the awardees described as exemplary leadership offered the sector by the Minister.

It was a period the airlines appraised their performance with a view to offering better quality service. In truth, the airlines under-performed when it comes to schedule integrity as flight delays/cancellation which dominated the last quarter of 2024 continued to dominate the media space again and again.

The sector witnessed improved stability in airlines’ operations; pockets of infrastructural face-lifts and recorded little growth. A closer look at events in the last three months suggests as much.

Still good safety record

One of the good tidings of 2024 is the zero crash in commercial operations in Nigeria. Although, the sector witnessed pockets of near misses, runway incursions and aircraft incidents but none involved fatality. The industry, therefore, has the enviable safety record. That good record was carried into the first quarter of 2025.

This has been made possible through improved safety in civil aviation; improvement in navigational aids; development of global strategies for safety in air transportation; maintenance of standards and recommended practices; and monitoring of safety trends.

. The implementation of targeted safety programmes and the Nigerian Civil Aviation Authority’s (NCAA) sustained robust regulations as well as well-trained aviation safety inspectors and airlines’ adherence to standard operating procedures also contributed.

The whole aviation community is ultrasensitive to safety issues all over the world; agencies and personnel connected with safety are demonstrating an uncanny dexterity.

Aviation is one of the most regulated industries in the world, and as a member of global aviation associations, the NCAA as well as the entire industry had been audited and would continue to be audited.

Harsh operating environment/Partnership

The harsh operating environment nonetheless, Air Peace continued on a roller-coaster ride, leveraging on partnerships to achieve some giant leaps. The Air Peace and Emirates partnership is still in place and has helped the Nigerian carrier to feed its domestic passengers into Emirates international operations. That sounds like a strategic move by the country’s carrier that is yet to explain why it has refused to directly reciprocate the Dubai route that has made Emirates be a sole operator on the lucrative Dubai-Lagos route.

While many of the operating airlines really struggled to stay afloat, few enhanced dominance by improving capacity. ValueJet has commenced direct Lagos-Jos flight and has concluded plans to spread its wings to the West Coast. Some other Nigerian carriers are equally planning to expand their operations.

Poor services continue

Flight delay by domestic airlines went unabated and has continued to take the joy out of air travel. The recent NCAA’s summary of flight operations in 2024 reveals that almost half of the domestic flights in Nigeria, and about 40% of foreign flights, were delayed.

This statistics has caused a lot of uproar. Some of the operators have disputed some of the figures released by the aviation regulatory body.

Green Africa said its August 2024 performance shows 456 scheduled flights, with 453 operated, 53 delayed, and four canceled. But NCAA’s data for the same month reported 416 operated flights, 101 delays, and four cancellations for the airline.

Ibom Air in what it termed the ‘Authentic Figures’ said the carrier operated 9,155 flights, , 1977 delay recorded, 1, 365, 427 flight cancelled.

The Nigerian aviation sector recorded what is now known to be the highest number of flight disruptions in its history in 2024.

Air Peace is at the top of the list, with 7,619 delayed flights out of 15,413 total flights in the year. United Airlines comes in a distant second with 4,559 delayed flights out of 7,794 total flights operated, while Arik Air is the third with 5,027 delayed flights out of 10,699 total flights operated.

In terms of cancelled flights, Air Peace is again at the top of the list, with 333 flights cancelled. Arik Air and Ibom Air are in the second and third positions, with 215 and 140 cancelled flights respectively.

Expert’s view

Aviation media consultant, Mr. Chris Azu Aligbe said the airlines’ protest over the data by NCAA was unexpected and was bound to raise issues and not saying that the data is foolproof because he was not part of it.

He lauded the NCAA describing as a step did as a step in the right direction. He likened what the NCAA did to exactly what the United States Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) does by accompanying it with heavy sanctions against airlines for infringing on passenger rights.

His words, “I applaud what NCAA is doing. I am not saying that their data is foolproof but beyond complaints, airlines should go back to the drawing board. There was a year Delta Airlines was sanctioned by FAA as the highest culprit in baggage handling. When they published it, Delta reacted immediately by appraising their system and in one year, Delta turned the entire thing around in one year and Delta became number one in baggage handling. Delta baggage handling became number one in the world”.

“This is what the airlines should do. The things that happen in the airline sector do not allow you to know when they are telling the truth. That is the problem. The airlines are not giving you the comfort to say yes, the airlines are telling the truth. They themselves should be publishing their performance.”.

He urged the NCAA not to wait for one year to publish airlines’ performance, stressing that that should be done every month.

“They should publish the data every month and they should include the flight time, the scheduled departure and number of minutes or hours they delay. They should have it on a monthly basis. That is what the NCAA should be publishing. If an airline is disputing it, they should bring out the details. If 50% of airlines’ flights are delayed, it is horrendous. Although, it is not all airlines that do this. Some airlines may be doing better than the others but the average is 50% delay or cancellations and that is why our airlines will not attract foreign partners to interline with them because of carrier liability. They should up the ante

Last line

The aviation industry in Nigeria is really challenged. The NCAA should be commended for its efforts particularly on flight delays. More work should be done to make airlines show responsibility to their customers.

Wole Shadare