After years of operating a daily route from Houston to Lagos, United Airlines will stop flying to Nigeria next month. Their last fight will be on June 30th, ending the airline’s only route to Africa. They confirmed this to a twitter user who asked them if it was true.
According to reports, United Airlines is ending their flights to Nigeria for two major reasons asides the one they mentioned above.
1, the weakness in the energy sector in Nigeria and
2. they (and other airlines) have been having difficulties collecting money from airline tickets sold in Nigeria.
Nigeria in the last few months have restricted the amount of money that can be moved abroad after the global slump in oil prices depleted our dollar reserve. Nigeria owed airlines about $575 million in air fares as of March 31, according to the International Air Transport Association.
United is not the first airline to end it’s route to Nigeria. British Airways had also allegedly threatened to stop flying to Nigeria if something is not done about their money being stuck here.
Delta Airlines will now be the only major U.S. carrier flying to Africa.
United Airlines closing shop here means a lot of Nigerians will lose their jobs. Quite sad!
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