A report by the Federal Airport Authority (FAAN) has revealed that Murtala Muhammed International Airport (MMIA) in Lagos recorded the highest number of international travellers with 670, 936 passengers in six months.
According to the Passenger’ Traffic Statistics Report, a total of 6, 420, 800 passengers travelled through International and domestic airports in the country between January and June 2021.
The report prepared by FAAN indicated that 5, 513, 098 represented the number of passengers that travelled to domestic destinations. While 907,722 was the figure for passengers that travelled to International destinations.
Murtala Muhammed International Airport is followed by Nnamdi Azikwe International Airport (NAIA), Abuja on the list of airports passengers patronise more for International travels. NAIA, within the period under review, had 225,985 travellers. NAIA was also first in domestic travels with 1,974,249 passengers. For domestic travels, Murtala Muhammed Airport had 1,786,236 passengers.
In the report, the airports in Lagos and Abuja accounted for 68.2 per cent of domestic arrivals and departures. Similarly, both airports accounted for 98.8 per cent of all international passengers. Consequently, the third on the list of international travel is Amino Kano International Airport with 10,119 International passengers.
The total number of both domestic and international travels is 50.5 per cent more than that recorded in the first six months of 2020. This may not be unconnected to the impart of 2020 COVID 19 and the lockdown that followed.
Furthermore, the report also stated that Murtala International Airport in Lagos alone accounted for 113.9 million kilogrammes of cargo representing a total of over 90 per cent of the total cargo handled at five International airports. The five International Airports include those in Lagos, Port Harcourt, Abuja, Kano and Enugu all of which handled a combined total of 126.4 million kilogrammes of cargo.
The 126.4 represents a 106 per cent increase in cargo in the same period in 2020. In the same period in 2020, only 61.2 million was recorded.