British Airways promised to partner
with the Nigeria in ensuring the success of the
transformation agenda in the nation’s aviation sector.
Mr
Keith Williams, Chief Executive Officer of British Airways had a closed door meeting with Vice
President Namadi Sambo. BA has been operating in Nigeria for the
past 76 years. British airways made its debut flight to Lagos in 1936 through its predecessor, Imperial Airways, one of the pioneering airlines in Africa.
The flight, an extension of a service from Kano to Khartoum,
connected to the weekly Imperial Airways flight from Khartoum to Croydon
in London. Imperial Airways was succeeded by BOAC, and at the end of
World War II it opened the London-Lagos services via Casablanca, Dakar
and Accra, with the flight taking 29 hours.
Commercial jet service will, however, start on the route on April 1,
1964, using a Vickers VC-10, flying London Heathrow-Kano-Lagos. These
services were taken over by British Caledonian Airways in 1971, which
later merged with British Airways.
"The
future of Nigeria and the transformation programme has grown
the economy and British Airways is an airline that supports the growth
of that economy through air travels.
“So, as the Nigerian economy grows, British Airways will grow with Nigeria. If
you look at British Airways, it has served Nigeria now for 76 years
and we get a great partnership with Nigeria which has been a long one
and an important one and it will always continue to be an important one
between the two countries and the British Airways supports that. Nigeria has huge domestic and international markets for
the growth of aviation industry and BA will explore the market for the
general good of Nigeria and the airline."
Williams commended the Federal Government on the way and manner the Aviation sector was
being managed in Nigeria. Nigeria needs to
build its domestic and regional aviation industry.
He
also described the ongoing merger activities between world leading
airlines as a welcome development for the global growth of the aviation
industry.
“The
aviation industry, if I look at the global aviation industry, the
global aviation is in a period of change and what we are seeing around
the world is the growth of cooperation, and that is in the case with
British Airways, which merged with Iberia, tying up with an American and
the Japanese airlines.
“So,
there are lots of merger activities happening to support global growth
in the airline industry, and clearly, Nigeria is a huge important
country with a huge population and it got important trade flows and the
airlines need to support those important trade flows whether that is
through Nigeria airlines or international airlines.”
He
further assured that BA would continue to meet its socio-economic
obligations to Nigeria in furtherance to its corporate responsibilities
in the country.
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