Despite a formal announcement by the United Arab Emirates (UAE) authorities on Tuesday that it was relaxing restrictions for inbound passengers from Nigeria (and five other countries) from Thursday, August 5, the country’s owned airline, Emirates will not heed the instructions till Sunday, August 15, ten 10 after the announcement became effective.
TheNewsGuru.com, TNG reports that the country in January had announced a ban on transit flights from Nigeria as it battled a rise in COVID-19 cases. But the Nigerian government retaliated with a counter ban on UAE flights into the country. This has however been lifted after both countries ironed things out.
“Travel for transit passengers from all countries from which transit passengers have been suspended will be resumed in advance provided that the passenger’s last destination is accepted with a laboratory check-up within 72 hours of departure and state airports will allocate special lounges for transit passengers
“Emergencies, crises and civil aviation announce the exclusion of new categories of passengers from some of the banned countries, including India, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Nepal, Nigeria and Uganda, as of August 5.
“These categories include those with valid residency permits who have received full vaccination doses in the UAE and 14 days have passed since receiving the second dose and who have vaccination certificates approved by the official authorities in the country,” a statement by the country’s National Emergency and Crisis Management Authority (NCEMA) said.
However, Checks on the Emirates airline official website by TNG on Friday revealed that “flights to and from Nigeria will remain suspended until 15 August 2021.”
The airline went on to state further: “Passengers who have traveled through or being to Nigeria in the last 14 days will not be permitted on any Emirates Airline bound to Dubai.”
Initially in a statement on its website, the airline included Nigeria among the six countries that passengers could travel to and through the UAE from Thursday August 5.
Surprisingly, by Wednesday morning, the Airline had deleted Nigeria from the list of countries that would be allowed to travel to/through UAE without a formal explanation for the exclusion.
Meanwhile, NCEMA is yet to reverse its earlier statement, which included passengers from Nigeria among six other countries that would be allowed to travel to/through the Emirates from August 5, 2021.
TNG notes that the Nigerian government is yet to react to the new development.