The Federal Government said yesterday that is scaling up efforts to implement a retaliatory air treaty regime on foreign carriers which countries insist Nigerian carriers must buy slots at their airports before granting approval for flights.
Director General, Nigerian Civil Aviation Authority (NCAA), Captain Musa Nuhu, disclosed this to newsmen on Monday.
The new regime, which he described as ‘tit- for – tat ‘has become imperative because some countries were deploying the slot allocation systems at their airports as a ploy to undermine Nigerian carriers.
He said Nigeria would not tolerate a situation where such countries hide under the cover of airport slots to give unfair commercial advantage to foreign carriers.
Nuhu said Nigeria made mistakes in the past and was determined to correct such anomalies.
He said United Arab Emirates (UAE) , carrier – Emirates Airlines would not be cleared to resume flights into Nigeria until civil aviation authorities in the Arab Nation officially communicated the extra flight frequency granted to Air Peace.
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The NCAA helmsman said: “Believe me, we are working on that and it is going to be tit-for-tat. Let me use an example and I am not saying that is what we are going to do, but just as an example. If a Nigerian airline is going to the United Kingdom and they insist that the Nigerian airline must buy slots, then any British Airlines that is coming into Nigeria will need to pay for slots too. It is tit-for-tat.
“If you tell me a particular airline from Nigeria cannot go to Heathrow because you cannot get slots, then, their airline too cannot come into Lagos because of slot issues. If you tell me a particular airline from Nigeria must pay, for instance, 100,000 pounds to operate to Heathrow, then, their own airline will have to pay the same amount of money to operate to Lagos. It is going to be reciprocity.
