Abuja — Airline operators yesterday protested the increasing cost of aviation fuel in the country and warned that the situation could lead to collapse of aviation businesses.

The operators lamented that despite the crash in the price of crude oil in the international market, the cost of aviation fuel had continued to rise at an alarming rate.

In a presentation before the House of Representatives Committee on Aviation, the aggrieved operators claimed that prohibitive cost of aviation fuel led to the collapse of no fewer than 30 airlines across the world, adding that such a negative trend could take its toll on the Nigerian aviation industry if nothing urgent was done.

Chief Executive Officer, Bellview Airlines, Mr Kayode Odukoya, who made the presentation on behalf of his colleagues, said the cost of aviation fuel in Nigeria was not only prohibitive, but about the highest in the world.

In the presentation tagged "Airfare and Cost of Operation in Nigeria," Odukoya attributted the high cost of air travel on high cost of aviation fuel, and urged lawmakers to intervene before airlines began to fold up. He warned that thousands of Nigerians currently bemployed in the industry will be forced back into the labour market if the airlines were allowed to fold up.

Odukoya listed other challenges to include, lack of long term capital, weak and poor airport infrastructure all of which have made the cost of operation very high and listed lack of fair competition, also querying the rationale behind allowing state owned carriers like Ethiopian, Emirates, South African Airways, Lufthansa, British Airways, indiscriminate frequency and multiple entry points into the Nigerian airspace.

Chairman of the committee, Honourable Bethel Amadi, decried the absence of aviation fuel marketers at the forum, insisting that the marketers were duly invited and should have honoured the invitation, given the importance of the issue under consideration.

The Committee invited major oil marketers, including African Petroleum, Conoil, Mobil, Oando, Sahara Energy, Texaco and Total, but they all shunned the exercise.