It was an assembly of august personalities that convened at the state-of-the-art EgyptAir office in Lagos on Monday November 29, 2021, where the General Manager (GM) of EgyptAir in Nigeria, Mr. Muharram Abdel Rahman met with a delegation from the Embassy of the Arab Republic of Egypt and the National Association of Nigerian Travel Agencies (NANTA) to discuss the various ways of strengthening the already thriving relationship between Egypt and Nigeria, particularly with regards to the aviation sector.
The delegation from the Egyptian Embassy in Abuja consisted of the Ambassador of Egypt to Nigeria, Mr. Ihab Moustafa Awad and the Commercial First Secretary and Head of the Economic and Commercial Office, Embassy of the Arab Republic of Egypt, Amr Altantawy; while the delegation from NANTA consisted of the NANTA President, Mrs. Susan Akporiaye; the Vice President, Lagos Zone, Mr. Yinka Folami amongst others.
In the NANTA President’s address, she cited COVID-19 as being at the origin of Nigeria discovering Egypt as a viable tourist destination – an interest which grew enormously after the intrigues of UAE banning Nigerians from visiting Dubai.
“We want to keep the relationship with Egypt going”, said the NANTA boss, who proceeded to table her recommendations to that effect, including her soliciting the Egyptian government to be more flexible with visa processing, even as she added, “We are not asking you to throw away all your rules; but it will be good not to have any bottlenecks either.”
Her second recommendation to help foster relations between the two countries was that the Egyptian government should accommodate more than one General Sales Agent (GSA) from Nigeria to handle visa processing and to provide tour packages from the Nigerian end, as one GSA will not suffice to service the entire market. These GSAs, she added, would be hand-picked by NANTA after a rigorous selection process and will come from across all the zones in Nigeria. “We are even open to signing an MOU if necessary, because we want this relationship to continue”, she said.
On his part, Mr. Yinka Folami reiterated that Egypt is a very easy destination to sell, and “all we need is access to visa.” The point was also raised concerning reports of bad treatment received by Nigerians at the airport in Cairo, to which Mr. Folami said, “There is negative talk about Nigerians and basically every other nationality out there, but give us access to visa, and we’ll weed out the bad eggs.”
In response, the Egyptian Ambassador had this to say: “My job is to be able to send back the message that Nigeria is a very big country, and those treating Nigerians badly in Cairo are in the minority; the majority of Egyptians have a very high respect for Nigerians.”
Regarding fostering the relationship between the two nations, Mr. Awad went on to say that it would be good for a leisure/business trip to be organized in the first half of 2022 so that the NANTA team can meet with its counterpart in Egypt, from whence negotiations can begin.
Pertaining to the GSAs, the Ambassador’s main concern was the guarantee of credibility, as according to him, “Many visas that were discovered at a certain point in time were forged visas.”
In response, Mrs. Akporiaye dissipated the Ambassador’s fears, saying that NANTA plans to adhere to certain criteria for determining which GSA gets to put together tour packages for Nigerian tourists – criteria which include the GSA’s credibility, its ability to meet with recommended standards put forward by the airlines and the Egyptian embassy, its staff capacity, amongst others.
According to the GM of EgyptAir, following the surge in demand in the Nigerian market, the airline is making more investments and the upgrading of its aircraft is scheduled for December 2021. EgyptAir is also increasing its total weekly flights from Lagos to nine (9), and two (2) more flights have been added to the Abuja route, bringing its total now to six (6); while Kano will increase from three (3) to four (4) weekly flights.
EgyptAir was the first African airline to operate into Nigeria and has stayed buoyant till date, with fifty-six (56) years’ worth of experience under its belt. The airline is making remarkable progress with its international route expansion scheme, as it is on the verge of commencing Chicago on January 1, 2022. Also, according to sources, customers can now look forward to Kinshasa and Kigali in the not-so-distant future.
