{"id":32189,"date":"2026-04-16T18:48:17","date_gmt":"2026-04-16T16:48:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/?post_type=news&p=32189"},"modified":"2026-04-16T18:49:53","modified_gmt":"2026-04-16T16:49:53","slug":"32189","status":"publish","type":"news","link":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/news\/32189\/","title":{"rendered":"Nigerian airlines threaten to halt flights over soaring jet fuel prices"},"content":{"rendered":"

Nigerian airlines will \u200bsuspend all flight operations from April 20, they warned, unless crippling jet fuel \u200cprices, which they accused the country’s fuel marketers of artificially inflating, are reduced.<\/span><\/p>\n

The Airline Operators of Nigeria (AON) , an industry body composed of around a dozen mainly domestic carriers, wrote to the Major Energies \u200bMarketers Association of Nigeria on April 14, complaining that jet fuel prices had \u200brisen by about 270% since late February.<\/p>\n

In the letter seen by Reuters<\/em>, \u2060AON called the jet fuel increase in Africa’s most populous nation “astronomical and artificial,” saying \u200bit far outpaced global crude oil prices. “Currently, airline revenues are insufficient to cover the cost \u200bof fuel alone,” the letter said.<\/p>\n

Soaring jet fuel prices have upended the global aviation industry as a consequence of the Iran war, forcing airlines to raise fares, curb growth plans and rethink forecasts. But African airlines are particularly vulnerable, \u200bas jet fuel typically accounts for between 30% and 40% of their operating costs, compared \u200bwith a global average of 20% to 25%, according to the African Airlines Association.<\/p>\n

Major Energies Marketers Association of Nigeria\u00a0disputed the \u200cairlines’ \u2060figures in a response to the AON seen by Reuters<\/em>, saying the quoted price was more than 40% above a survey-based market average, adding that jet fuel distribution involves specialised equipment and handling that make it more cost-intensive.
\nAON said that raising ticket prices to \u200breflect the fuel costs \u200bairlines are facing in \u2060Nigeria could reduce passenger numbers, while a shutdown of airline operations would have broader repercussions, hurting banks, costing jobs and worsening insecurity.<\/p>\n

Nigeria\u2019s \u200baviation sector consumed about 2.1 million litres of jet fuel per \u200bday last \u2060month, data from the country’s petroleum products regulator showed.<\/p>\n

However, the giant Dangote Petroleum Refinery Nigeria’s sole domestic jet fuel producer – made no deliveries to the domestic market in March, the data \u2060showed.<\/p>\n

At \u200bthe same time, data from tanker-tracking firm Kpler showed \u200bNigeria’s exports of clean petroleum products, gasoline, diesel, kerosene and jet fuel more than doubled month-on-month in March.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

–Reuters–<\/p>\n","protected":false},"featured_media":20722,"template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false},"news-type":[26],"class_list":["post-32189","news","type-news","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","news-type-general_news","entry"],"acf":{"short_description":"Nigerian airlines will \u200bsuspend all flight operations from April 20.","published_date":"","news_description":"Nigerian airlines will \u200bsuspend all flight operations from April 20","form_embed":"","author":"","image_caption":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/32189","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/news"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/32189\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":32192,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/32189\/revisions\/32192"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/20722"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=32189"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"news-type","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news-type?post=32189"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}