Nigeria’s Aviation Market Now Fourth-Largest in Africa – FAAN
By Nafiu Muhammad Lema
Nigeria’s aviation market has become the fourth-largest in Africa, recording more than 18.8 million domestic and international passengers in 2025, the Federal Airports Authority of Nigeria (FAAN) has disclosed.
The Managing Director of FAAN, Mrs Olubunmi Onabanjo-Kuku, disclosed this at the 2026 Airports Council International (ACI) Africa Regional Conference and Exhibition in Abuja, where she highlighted the growth of Nigeria’s aviation sector and the need to strengthen airport infrastructure and operational resilience.
Onabanjo-Kuku said Nigeria recorded an 11.9 per cent year-on-year increase in passenger traffic in 2025, reflecting growing demand for air travel and the country’s expanding role in the African aviation market.
She also revealed that Murtala Muhammed International Airport in Lagos recorded a 24.1 per cent increase in scheduled seat capacity in September, the fastest growth among Africa’s 10 largest airports during the period.
According to her, Nigeria’s scheduled airline capacity reached 1.19 million seats in September 2026, representing a 37.4 per cent increase compared with the same period in 2025. She described the growth as the fastest among Africa’s top 10 aviation markets, citing data from OAG.
The FAAN managing director also pointed to broader growth in African aviation, noting that international passenger demand for African airlines increased by 6.4 per cent year-on-year in July 2026, compared with a 0.1 per cent decline in global international demand during the same period.
She said Africa’s overall passenger demand also grew by 5.2 per cent, describing the development as evidence of the continent’s increasing importance in the global aviation sector.
On the future of airport development, Onabanjo-Kuku stressed the need for investment beyond visible infrastructure, including predictive maintenance, reliable power supply, digital operational systems and data-driven decision-making.
She identified operational resilience, human capital development and strategic partnerships as key requirements for sustaining growth in the sector.
According to her, airport resilience should involve the ability to respond quickly and effectively to disruptions through improved redundancy, agility, communication and intelligence.
She also called for continuous training and development of aviation professionals capable of managing increasingly complex airport operations.
On partnerships, Onabanjo-Kuku said government resources alone could not meet the scale of investment and expertise required to modernise the sector.
She urged greater collaboration between government and private investors, airlines, technology companies, logistics firms and development finance institutions to drive sustainable growth in Nigeria’s aviation industry.
The conference, themed “Next-Gen Airports: Driving Performance and Resilience,” brought together aviation stakeholders to discuss the future of airport management, infrastructure, technology and resilience across Africa.
