Experts Condemn De-marketing of Nigerian Airlines

Chinedu Eze

Recently Fari Elysian (Farida Mirzebalaeva), a popular Russian born actress and content creator who lives in Nigeria posted a serious message about how Nigerians underrate other Nigerians.

In the message, she said she noticed that Nigerians show too much love to foreigners and run down their own. She added that many Nigerians do not have confidence in what they have and would rather criticise it while identifying with and admiring what is foreign. Her candour elicited self-defense from some Nigerians while others acknowledged her observation.

Some observant Nigerians have always noted this and said that the tendency for many Nigerians to look down on local goods and services while admiring foreign ones—often referred to as a ‘foreign preference’ or ‘colonial mentality’—is a complex issue rooted in psychological, economic, and historical factors.

Nowhere has this behaviour been so highly exhibited than in the aviation industry. Evidence show that when Nigerians are travelling with foreign airlines and there is disruption, they do not react the same way they do if the disruption involved a Nigerian carrier. Recently, I posed questions in relation to this to some country managers managing foreign airlines in the country.

Some attribute it to influence, saying that British Airways, Lufthansa, Delta Air Lines, Air France and other big carriers are protected by influential Nigerians. A Nigerian passenger travelling to the US told this medium that the major reason is the fear that if you come hard on foreign airline, “when it takes you to your destination, they can speak to immigration authorities and they will revoke your visa.”

In June 2024, Lagos- London passengers on British Airways flight were stranded for two days when the airline cancelled its flight due to technical issues. The passengers were taken to a hotel after several hours of waiting at the airport, where they stayed for over 48 hours, while the airline operated its subsequent flights. Many of the passengers who were interviewed reported limited communication and poor customer service from the airline.

British Airways did not airlift them to London eventually. Rather, some passengers were placed on other carriers like Virgin Atlantic and other European carriers. No passenger on that flight did a video to complain or staged a protest at the airport.

Also, on Saturday, May 11, 2026 Delta Air Lines Atlanta-Lagos flight left for Lagos and spent over three and half hours when the pilot made air return to Atlanta, citing technical issues. So, the passengers in the flight were flown for eight hours without arriving to their destination. They went back to Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport (ATL).

A passenger in the flight explained that when they were returned to Atlanta, the airline provided hotel for the passengers but some of them refused to go to the hotel and rather stayed at the airport. The consequence of the abortion of that flight was that the airline did not operate its Lagos-Atlanta flight the following day, which was May 12. The passengers had arrived the airport that morning for 11:45 am flight only to be told midway after waiting for some time that the flight was cancelled. There was no immediate directive on what they should do. But later in the day, the business class passengers were contacted and promised they would be accommodated in the next flight (if there were available business class seats). The uncertainty of the situation and poor communication forced some business class passengers to buy tickets of other airlines to fly to the US. No Nigerian passenger in the Delta Air Lines flight did a video and posted it on social media to lament the treatment meted to them by the airline.

But as at Tuesday May 12, Nigerians were still lamenting the flight cancellation Air Peace did on May 1, 2026, when its aircraft suffered bird strike at the Gatwick Airport, London. When the question of Air Peace cancelling its London-Lagos flight with false allegation that the passengers were stranded, was thrown at the Director General, Nigeria Civil Aviation Authority (NCAA), Captain Chris Najomo, he said: “I do not agree with you, using the word stranded. No airline will want to leave his or her passengers stranded. Flight cancellation happens everywhere, delays, cancellations. What happened with the Air Peace in London that went viral is not very good. You know, we should protect our own. Look at what happened to Delta. Look at what happened to other airlines. Was there any video about it? Nobody talked about it.

“My wife was on that flight. They landed, every passenger disembarked. It was when the ramp check was going on that they noticed the bird strike. And Air Peace did the right thing by not operating that flight. They called Boeing to say, look, this is what has happened. And they told them, no, you cannot operate that flight. So, what do you expect them to do? The airline did what it had to do. I investigated it. The airline told the passengers to wait for the aircraft coming in from Abuja, to take the passengers back. The airline provided accommodation for the passengers in a hotel located inside the airport. So, I don’t know what is wrong about this thing going viral, you know. We should support our own,”

Industry analyst and the Managing Director of Flight and Logistic Solutions Limited, Amos Akpan, said the way Nigerians react when indigenous carriers have operations issues stems from ignorance or inaccurate information on civil aviation issues.

“It is the responsibility of the airlines, the industry stakeholders, the aviation agencies, and the aviation journalists in Nigeria to relentlessly educate the Nigerian public on aviation issues. We have to continue giving out the correct version of information on issues in the industry. How do you place it when passengers accuse an operator of being unprofessional because an aircraft is withdrawn from service in compliance with procedures and technical specifications? The same operator takes time to bring in a substitute aircraft to operate that same service. Then the passengers got angry and labelled that operator with negative comments. The operator followed the right course of action for safety and still operated that service, albeit delayed, yet they performed in line with global aviation standards and recommended practices.

“It is baffling when we observe that the same Nigerian travellers tolerate these practices from foreign airlines. There are Nigerians working as pilots and engineers in these foreign airlines. In aviation, we take the globally prescribed standard practices and domesticate them within our territories,” Akpan said.

He noted that as concerned authorities continue to inform the Nigerian public “we are resetting their mental perceptions about Nigerian airlines.”

According to Akpan, “Also, the aviation journalists have to influence their colleagues covering other sectors, especially their news compilation team in their offices, on matters of aviation. The problem is exacerbated by social media where everybody gets a platform to give “expert” opinions on every subject matter and event. Social media publications blur the accuracy of information. People don’t read the conditions of the contract in their airline tickets to know what their responsibility is and the airline’s responsibility. They will read what someone writes on X about happenings on their trip and make noise with that information.”

As the Russian actress, Fari Elysian, advised, Nigerians should start loving their own and also protect their own.