The days of rendering a more conscious service may be here as the Nigeria Civil Aviation Authority (NCAA) sanctions against several local airlines and two international airlines for infringing on passengers rights in 2024 and other related infractions have put the airlines on their toes.
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Acting Director-General, NCAA, Chris Najomo
The local airlines sanctioned by the NCAA for violating passengers rights are Air Peace, Arik Air and Aero Contractors, while the international airlines include Ethiopian Airlines and Morrocan givernment-owned Royal Air Maroc.
According to Michael Achimugu, NCAA’s director of public affairs and consumer protection, who announced the sanctions on Christmas eve, the airlines violated Part 19 of NCAA Regulations of 2023. The regulation deal with passengers rights, airlines obligations to passengers and general consumer protection issues, as well as set out compensation for overbooking, denied boarding, delayed and cancelled flights.
Specifically, Achimugu stated that the violations include failure to refund passengers within the stipulated time frame, non-responsiveness to authority’s directives, incidents of missing and manhandled luggage, short-landed baggage, and issues relating to flight delays and cancellations.
This development is heartwarming considering the disturbing number of flight delays and cancelled scheduled flights by airlines in Nigeria. Cases of missing luggage have also become too frequent, with passengers remaining helpless when they fall victims. Airlines have been warned several times but have not been sanctioned for these unprofessional and poor services for a long time.
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Air Peace Chairman, Allen Onyema
Achimugu said in a statement: “This is the first time in over a decade that the NCAA Consumer Protection Department is initiating sanctions against airlines.”
In the months of September and October, 2024, The Nigerian Economy reported that domestic airlines in Nigeria cancelled a total of 190 flights and delayed 5,200 scheduled flights resulting in thousands of manhour losses to air transport users and their businesses.
“Our flight operations data record indicates that in September, 2024, five thousand two hundred and ninety-one domestic flights were operated with 2,434 delays and 79 cancellations. In October, 2024, 5,513 flights were operated with 2,791 delays and 111 cancellations recorded,” said NCAA acting director-general, Chris Najomo during a recent aviation stakeholders meeting in Lagos.
With this sanction, it is now expected that airlines will become more professional and improve on their services. A passenger, Mr James Ebiye, said the sanction had double advantage of making the airline operators to sit up, while restoring passengers confidence on regulators to cause the airlines to do the right thing.
“Without such a regulatory move, many passengers were already leaving the air transport option. The airlines would one day see that there are no passengers to lift,” Ebiye said.
Meanwhile, some of the affected airlines were reported to have accepted the NCAA enforcement decision, while recognising their lapses and promising to change for the better.
The chief execitive of Air Peace, Allen Onyema has reacted to the sanctions, saying that the regulator’s enforcement action was right.
The authority said Onyema, who is also Air Peace’s chairman, acknowledged some of the infractions by his staff and pledged to ensure compliance with the NCAA’s directives, particularly regarding timely passenger refunds.
He was quoted as saying: “I am glad that this has happened. I have warned my team. This shows that the NCAA know what they are doing. I will always acknowledge it where the fault is ours.”
Ethiopian Airlines has also indicated readiness to comply with consumer and related regulations.
The NCAA disclosed that Ethiopian Airlines sought further engagement with the authority regarding the enforcement actions issued against it.
According to the authority, the international airline expressed readiness to comply with the NCAA’s regulations and pledged to submit a compliance report by the following day.
