Nigeria Air (NWB, Lagos) has a startup budget of USD250 million, of which the Nigerian Federal Government will only contribute USD12.5 million in line with its 5% share in the proposed new home-based carrier.

This has been disclosed by the Abuja-based transaction advisor on the national airline, Tilmann Gabriel, in an editorial published in several Nigerian newspapers recently.

He said the startup's application for an air operator's certificate (AOC) had reached Phase Three of five stages at the Nigerian Civil Aviation Authority (NCAA).

Nigeria's Federal Executive Council would shortly sign off its approval of the contracts with the preferred bidder consortium of Nigerian investors led by Ethiopian Airlines, he said, following a transparent bidding and decision process managed under the private-public partnership (PPP) process governed by the independent Infrastructure Concession Regulatory Commission (ICRC) that oversees privatisation processes in Nigeria.

"By the transparent and structured PPP process, the Government has ensured a clear ownership structure, including the leading African airline, with a secured startup budget which gives Nigeria Air a solid financial foundation," he said.

"Nigeria Air is ready to launch with a fleet of Boeing 737s on domestic services, [and] is currently recruiting many Nigerian aviation professionals to help start the airline operation. The operations control centre at Abuja is ready to be opened with the most modern IT systems. The booking engines on the airline website and App will be available shortly with loyalty credit cards and other innovative pay systems."

Gabriel's editorial was making a case for the startup against the backdrop of court proceedings continuing in Lagos on January 16, where the Airline Operators of Nigeria (AON) is challenging the airline's establishment, citing anti-competitive reasons. The Nigerian Federal High Court in Lagos on November 24, 2022, ordered all parties to maintain the status quo pending the case's determination after it had already granted the AON an interim injunction preventing the government from selling shares in Nigeria Air to Ethiopian Airlines.

Nigeria Air, meanwhile, has applied for AON membership to align itself with the "common interests of the Nigerian airline industry," Gabriel disclosed.

The nascent carrier also faces potential political uphill depending on who wins the general elections in Nigeria on February 25. Incumbent President Muhammadu Buhari is ineligible to run, being term-limited. An Afrobarometer survey in August 2022 found 88.7% of Nigerians believed the country was heading in the wrong direction, 84.5% thought the economy was either bad or fairly bad, while 77% were dissatisfied with their democracy.