Several Nigerian airlines announced job cuts, unpaid leave and salary reductions in the months following the March 2020 flight suspensions, as carriers with no passenger revenue struggled to cover fixed costs including aircraft leases, staff pay and airport charges. The Airline Operators of Nigeria said the sector was losing billions of naira monthly and warned that some carriers risked collapse without government support.
Widespread Cost-Cutting
Multiple domestic operators reduced their workforce or placed cabin crew, ground staff and administrative employees on reduced pay during the roughly three-and-a-half-month grounding of domestic flights, with some airlines retaining only skeleton crews to service cargo and emergency charter operations. Industry officials said pilots and engineers were among the highest-cost staff categories affected, as airlines sought to preserve cash while aircraft sat idle.
The AON used the crisis to renew longstanding calls for a reduction in the multiple charges and taxes levied on airlines by federal agencies, arguing that the pandemic had exposed how thin operating margins were even in normal times, and that the sector would need sustained relief to rebuild jobs lost during the shutdown.