Air passenger traffic in Nigeria has failed to return to pre-covid era owing to low disposable income, high cost of air fares and depleting fleet size, stakeholders have said.
The country’s passenger movement from 2021 till date show steady reduction of passenger movement in the domestic patronage of air travel.
Before COVID, Nigerian airports processed an average of 17 million passengers annually, but since the year 2021 till date, the country’s air passenger traffic has hovered between 13 million to 16 million passengers, showing stunted growth.
On the other hand, South Africa, Kenya and Egypt which are part of Africa’s top largest economies have recorded some level of growth since the covid era.
“The FG Reforms have negatively impacted and indeed pressured the middle-class, who are growth drivers, including passenger travels. The cost of living has increased due to real inflation and not at the same pace as their income. The higher exchange rate accentuates this because Nigerians usually peg or mark their living in respect to the USD,” Seyi Adewale, CEO of Mainstream Cargo Ltd, said.
Adewale also hinted that the ‘Japa syndrome’ has lowered repeated travels because many in good employment have moved outside the country, adding that people are exploring other transport channels (when travel becomes necessary) such as road and rail, he said.
“For example, the Kaduna-Abuja rail is back! Importantly, many conferences and seminars now provide online channels for participants and many more people are latching on to this and still picking up conference or seminar attendance certificates,” he said.
During pre-covid era, the country’s airports processed an average of 17 million passengers and since 2021 till date, passenger figures are yet to hit these numbers.
According to the Nigeria Civil Aviation Authority (NCAA) executive summary of international and domestic flight operations from January to December 2024, passenger traffic from all Nigeria’s local and international airports was 15,685,192.
In 2021, Nigeria recorded 14, 249, 542, according to the NCAA. This was made up of 12,050,264 domestic passenger movements and 3, 199, 278 international passenger movements.
In 2022, air Travel traffic peaked at 16. 2 million in both domestic and international travel, with over 12 million on domestic travel, while about four million travelled on international destinations.
Nigeria recorded a total number of 15, 685, 272 passengers in 2023, which was less than 16 172 433 who passed through the airports in 2022.
While data for all Kenya’s airports were not available, its busiest airport, Jomo Kenyatta International Airport (JKIA) along with major other airports was captured in the data.
Kenya’s pre-COVID air passenger figures were almost 12 million.
In 2021, most of Kenya’s airports recorded 7.32 million passengers.
In 2022, the numbers rose to 10.2 million total passengers.
In 2023, the numbers again rose to 12.2 million total passengers, hitting its pre-COVID era.
Data for 2024 had not yet been compiled at the time this report was done.
Egypt’s pre-COVID air passenger figures show an average of 12 million.
In 2021, approximately 7.94 million air passengers travelled through Egyptian airports.
In 2022, Egyptian airports recorded an exponential growth of 38 million passengers, surpassing pre-covid era. This figure placed Egypt as the top performer in terms of total passenger traffic in Africa. Notably, Cairo International Airport played a significant role, accommodating over 26 million passengers.
In 2023, Egyptian airports saw a significant increase in passenger traffic, reaching nearly 47 million passengers, a 28 per cent surge compared to the previous year.
In 2024, Cairo International Airport, the largest and busiest in Egypt, handled 27.7 million passengers. Other Egyptian airports recorded 22 million passengers. This indicates the entire passenger figure for 2024 was 49.7 million, another significant increase from the previous year.
Egyptian airports experienced a 9% increase in passenger traffic compared to 2023, reaching a total of 22.097 million passengers.
For South Africa, data was not available for all its airports but BusinessDay captured data for 4 most busiest airports in the country which include O.R. Tambo International Airport (Johannesburg), Cape Town International Airport, King Shaka International Airport (Durban), and Lanseria International Airport.
South Africa’s pre-COVID-19 average for these four airports was an average of 39.6 million passengers.
In 2021, the four South Africa airports recorded 23.7 million passengers. The figures rose to 30.8 million passengers in 2022. In 2023, the figures further rose to 34.3 million. All figures for 2024 were not available at the time of compiling these reports. While South African air passenger traffic is yet to hit pre-covid era, the passenger traffic numbers have recorded steady growth since 2021.
Olumide Ohunayo, industry analyst and Director, Research, Zenith Travels, told BusinessDay in 2024, Nigeria’s international travels did not do badly because more international and African airlines started operating into Nigeria.
He said this encouraged more travellers and brought down the average fares.
Ohunayo said the domestic market, on the other hand, has not seen new airlines impacting the market.
“The domestic airlines operating in Nigeria are struggling and losing capacity and this has not allowed fares to come down. There is also a general inflationary trend within the economy caused by the floating of the naira and the fuel price which affected transportation generally,” he noted.
According to him, all these factors have not encouraged passengers to fly nor has it expanded and this is why Nigeria is not having passenger numbers increase.
He also mentioned that the incessant delays and cancellations have discouraged travel.
Data obtained by BusinessDay from the NCAA last year showed that 13 domestic airlines operating in Nigeria operate a total of 91 aircraft. This data includes aircraft that have undergone maintenance.
Sources close to the NCAA told BusinessDay that apart from Dana Air that has been grounded, over half of the 91 aircraft have gone on maintenance and some have become aircraft on ground, putting a strain on the few operating aircraft.
BusinessDay’s checks show that five years ago, there were just 10 domestic airlines operating on Nigerian routes. However, they had over 120 planes at that time.
