EMIRATES flight operations will officially resume services in Nigeria on October 1, 2024.

According to a statement by the Arab Emirate on Thursday, May 16, the flight will be operating a daily service between Lagos and Dubai, and offering customers more choice and connectivity from Lagos to, and through, Dubai.

It noted that the service would be operated using a Boeing 777-300ER, with EK783 departing Dubai at 0945hrs and arriving in Lagos at 1520hrs.

It further stated that the return flight EK784 would leave Lagos at 1730hrs and arrive in Dubai at 0510hrs the following day.

“We are excited to resume our services to Nigeria. The Lagos-Dubai service has traditionally been popular with customers in Nigeria and we hope to reconnect leisure and business travellers to Dubai and onwards to our network of over 140 destinations. 

“We thank the Nigerian government for their partnership and support in re-establishing this route and we look forward to welcoming passengers back onboard,” the statement quoted the Emirates’ deputy president and chief commercial officer, Adnan Kazim, saying.

The statement noted that with the resumption of operations to Nigeria, Emirates would be serving 19 gateways in Africa, operating 157 flights per week from Dubai.

Emirate stated it had built strong bilateral trade relations with Nigeria, being a major economic hub in Africa, over the years.

The airline added that with the resumption of daily passenger flights, its cargo arm, Emirates SkyCargo, would further bolster the trade relationship by offering more than 300 tonnes of bellyhold cargo capacity, in and out of Lagos weekly.

The ICIR reported how the Minister of Aviation and Aerospace Development, Festus Keyamo, disclosed that Emirates Airline had officially written to the Nigerian government to resume flight operations into the country before June 2024.

Keyamo disclosed this on Arise TV’s “The Morning Show” on Monday, April 8, noting that he had received a letter from the airline on the planned resumption.

He, however, said that the first announcement in October 2023 over the proposed resolution of the face-off between both nations was not fake news but was ‘hasty’.

In 2020, Emirates suspended flight operations to Nigeria — for the second time in the year – over its inability to repatriate its revenue trapped in the country.

Similarly, the airline had suspended all flights from Nigeria effective September 1, 2022, due to what it called the challenges in repatriating its funds.

The Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN)  earlier confirmed the clearance of verified backlog owed foreign airlines, which totalled $136.73 million.

Mustapha USMAN

Usman Mustapha is a solution journalist with International Centre for Investigative Reporting. You can easily reach him via: [email protected]. He tweets @UsmanMustapha_M