The government of the United Arab Emirates (UAE) has granted Nigerian airline company Air Peace seven slots at Dubai airport.
This comes days after the Nigerian government slammed restrictions on Emirates Airlines, the flag carrier of UAE, in retaliation of the denial of the three slots requested for by Air Peace in Sharjah Airport.
Director-general of the Nigerian Civil Aviation Authority (NCAA), Capt. Musa Nuhu, had last Thursday announced the withdrawal of the winter schedule comprising 21 frequencies; that is 14 in Lagos and seven in Abuja, earlier approved for Emirates.
Left with a weekly flight to Abuja, the airline suspended its operations to Nigeria indefinitely.
Nuhu said Nigeria’s action was in retaliation of the denial of the requested slots by Air Peace, the sole Nigerian carrier operating to Dubai via Sharjah.
However, director-general of the Dubai Civil Aviation Authority (DCAA), Mohammed A. Ahli, in a letter dated December 13, 2021 and addressed to the chairman of Air Peace Allen Onyema, said seven slots had been granted to the airline to operate to Dubai airport.
The letter read: “The Dubai Civil Aviation Authority presents the compliments to the Honourable Management of Air Peace Nigeria.
“Your Excellency, relations between our two countries go a long way back and we value these relations between our two brotherly countries.
“We write in reference to Air Peace’s possible/intended operations to/from Dubai Airports (DXB), we have received information from Dubai Authority, with regard to slot availability at DXB – Terminal 1 and as a gesture of goodwill and a support of UAE and Nigeria relations, I case Air Peace wish to start flights, slots have been blocked by Dubai Airports as detailed below.
“Slots available and blocked for Air Peace are the following: All days.
“As these slots cannot be blocked indefinitely, we would highly appreciate if Air Peace could kindly reach out to Dubai Airports and inform them of their intentions to operate by Thursday 16th December 2021 and accordingly confirm the blocked slots.”
