EDITORIAL: Reinforcing our diplomacy in Nigeria-UK BASA crisis

All is not well in the operation of the Bilateral Air Service Agreement (BASA) between Nigeria and the United Kingdom, with the latter’s refusal of the country’s carrier, Air Peace, to use Heathrow airport for its operations. The airline’s several efforts to break the thaw have yielded no positive result so far, thereby compelling the Nigerian government to step into the matter. The Minister of Aviation and Aerospace Development, Festus Keyamo, is not just talking tough, but has communicated the country’s position to the UK authorities. Nigeria should not waver until the issue is resolved.

BASA is a protocol that nations enter into that allows each other’s airlines to operate in their territories on mutually agreed terms. Besides the UK, Nigeria has such bilateral pacts with the United States, India, Ethiopia, Morocco, Rwanda and a number of other countries. British Airways and Virgin Atlantic – two of the UK’s aviation behemoths, leverage the agreement to operate 21 flights to Nigeria every week, using the country’s prime Murtala Muhammed International Airport, Lagos and Nnamdi Azikiwe International Airport in Abuja.

However, after much pressure, the UK authorities resentfully conceded a once-daily slot to Air Peace from Lagos to Gatwick, totalling seven frequencies weekly. This operation began on 31 March with 260 passengers in the airline’s newly acquired 777 Boeing aircraft. It came seven years after the last of such flights by Medview Airline.

Gatwick is not only a secondary airport in London, but in relation to British Airway’s 14 weekly flights to Nigeria and seven to Virgin Atlantic, amounting to 21 frequencies per week, as against the only seven weekly frequencies allowed to Air Peace, this highlights an imbalance that does not sit well with Nigeria within the context of BASA.

Air Peace

This unfairly gnaws at the country’s foreign exchange situation. The challenge it posed was writ large in the $850 million worth of foreign airline ticket sales, which the operators could not repatriate to their home countries for a while as Nigeria’s forex crisis worsened. It forced Emirates Airline and others to suspend their operations, until recently, when the Tinubu administration cleared the backlog.

The minister has written to the UK Transport Secretary, Louise Haigh, urging that the mutual agreement, which dates back to 1988, be respected; just as he was categorical that its disregard denigrates Nigeria and its citizens. Interestingly, British Airways has been flying into Lagos since 1936.

Keyamo’s letter reads, in part, “I wish to emphatically state that if Air Peace is not allocated a slot at the London Heathrow Airport, it might be difficult for British flag carriers to access Nigeria’s tier one airports from the next Winter Season, unless when a frank discussion is opened with us to break the debacle associated with the slot allocation at Heathrow to the Airline and other Nigerian designated airlines.”

Nothing less is expected. The underlying principle in BASA is reciprocity; reinforced by the fact that it is a strong weapon in diplomatic relations. Therefore, Nigerian leadership would be viewed as spineless and irresponsible if it doesn’t invoke it in relation to the UK. Running away from such challenges is how nations lose their dignity and respect in international circles.

In the UK, there is the argument that Heathrow is now being managed under a concessionary arrangement, and therefore the government’s hands are tied. We consider this as an evasive and duplicitous logic. Equity and the sanctity of bilateral pacts require that “whatever concessionary arrangement the UK has with a third party, the concessionaire should legally inherit” its existing obligations, as Keyamo pragmatically stated.

Nigeria’s Minister of Aviation Aerospace Development, Festus Keyamo.

Air Peace has scheduled its flight operations to Heathrow airport for November. The Lagos-Heathrow route is one of the most lucrative globally in the aviation business. Evidently, with subterfuge, the UK authorities are protecting this market for their airlines.

What Nigeria stands to gain from Air Peace securing landing rights at Heathrow was evident in the crash of prices of air tickets shortly after it began its Lagos-Gatwick flight, not just for the airline, but other international airlines – including British Airways and Virgin Atlantic. The Air Peace fare for an economy ticket was N1.2 million and business class ticket, N4 million, contrary to the N3 million for an economy ticket and N11 million for the business class for BA.

But suddenly fares for the UK airlines were crashed heavily. For instance, the economy class ticket was slashed to N1.7 million and the business class ticket came down to N6 million. Lufthansa and others acted in tow, pointing to an unmistakable war of attrition against Air Peace.

This has marked the beginning to the end of exploitative ticket fares and the inauguration of fair market competition. It was a massive gain in foreign exchange for the country. As a result, everything should be done to sustain it. This is a classic case of economic diplomacy that President Tinubu should be concerned about – a reality that should inform the Minister of Foreign Affairs, Yusuf Tuggar’s involvement in the discussions. Where necessary, the president should bring the full weight of his office to bear on the matter.

President Bola Tinubu 

Other nations had been encouraged by the UK’s dirty tricks and intransigence in denying Air Peace its fair share of the market. Among them were the United Arab Emirates (UAE) and Ethiopia. But the complementarity slots they had with our flag carrier have been somewhat settled. On the Nigeria-UK (Lagos/Abuja to Heathrow) route row, John Ojikutu, a member of the Aviation Round Table, has noted that the intrigues are not new. “We had a similar problem with Arik operations to the UK some years ago and there were some diplomatic moves that restored the airline’s operations from Gatwick to Heathrow.” This confirms the fact that what has been happening is a perversion deployed to perpetuate UK airlines’ stranglehold on that route against Nigeria’s interest.

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However, this could not have been the case if the defunct Nigeria Airways – our national carrier – had not been killed by official corruption. At the zenith of its operations, former President Olusegun said it had a fleet of 32 aircraft when he left office in 1979 as a military head of state. “But when I came back in 1999, I only met one.”

The Lagos-Heathrow route is a critical economic asset and diplomatic war that the Tinubu administration must recover and win in the national interest. The crisis transcends Air Peace as an airline or a personal business. The airline engages in regular flights to China, Saudi Arabia, South Africa, India and Ukraine, and has come to the rescue of the country and stranded Nigerians during periods of global crises; at times, even offering its services free of charge. To save it, and other local airlines, on the verge of deepening their offshore operations, from international conspiracies, is not a burden too much for the country to shoulder.