Airlines may halt operations today over fuel scarcity
By Wole Shadare, Aviation Reporter
A CUTE aviation fuel scarcity may force airlines operating on domestic routes to abandon their flights today as they have been unable to procure Jet A1 for refuelling.
The Lagos Station Manager of Chanchangi Airlines, Muhammed Tukur told aviation correspondents yesterday that "Jet A1 was sold earlier in the day at the rate of N80 per litre, and it was very scarce".
The Chanchangi chief also stated that this made most domestic airlines to operate skeletal flights yesterday. He appealed to the Federal Government to improve the situation.
According to Tukur, the major marketers are claiming that they have not taken delivery of aviation fuel for several weeks now, a situation which caused the scarcity. "Airlines would be grounded for the next three days, when there is no likelihood of Jet A1", Tukur said.
He stated that many passengers might be left unattended to as the airlines could not say when aviation fuel would be made available.
Chairman of Airline Operators of Nigeria, Steve Mahonwu, confirmed the scarcity.
"Whether there would be flights on Friday or not, tomorrow will take care of itself, but all I can tell you is that there is no fuel to buy", he said.
An employee of Space World Airlines also confirmed the scarcity, stating "it was hectic getting aviation fuel today (Thursday)," adding to that, a lot of their flights were delayed. Just recently, the price of aviation fuel was increased from N45.00 to N62.00 which led to the recent increase in domestic air fares.
The Guardian's investigation showed that only Oando Plc sold to domestic operators yesterday, as other oil marketers had run out of stock.
The increase in the price of the commodity further prompted the operators to consider buying fuel from neighbouring African countries where it would be obtained at a cheaper rate.
The airline operators had threatened to import the commodity from countries like Ghana, where it is far cheaper than the over N80 and N60 price tag in Nigeria.
While the Ghanian government has a price control mechanism to check fuel price increases, such a system is absent in Nigeria.
Tukur appealed to the Federal Government to check the fuel shortage which, he said, was capable of throwing the industry into a serious crisis.
He said: "The situation may cause serious disaster to domestic operations. The scarcity has been on for three weeks but in the last one week it has been acute as most operators have been forced to cut flights due to perennial scarcity."
He equally appealed to oil marketers to stop what he described as artificial scarcity, stressing that even at N80 per litre for JET A1, the commodity remain scarce.
Some stranded passengers who had their flights outrightly cancelled or rescheduled blamed the government for allowing the situation to degenerate by not calling the marketers to order. Others blamed the parlous state of the nation's refineries for the problem.
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