Emirates resumes flight to Nigeria

The airline says it will resume flights on December 5.

Dubai’s flagship carrier, Emirates, says it will resume its passenger operations between Dubai and Nigeria from 5 December 2021, offering customers enhanced connectivity to and through Dubai.

A statement on the airline’s website said the world’s largest international airline will operate to and from its Nigerian gateways with daily flights, providing travellers from Nigeria convenient access to Dubai, which remains a highly popular holiday and business destination.

It will also enable travelers to safely connect via Dubai to the Emirates network of over 120 global destinations, the statement said.

“Emirates will operate to Abuja with EK 785 and 786. EK 785 will depart Dubai at 1100hrs, arriving in Abuja at 1540hrs,” the statement said.

“The return flight, EK 786 will take off from Abuja at 1900, arriving in Dubai at 0435hrs the next day.

“Emirates flight EK 783 to Lagos will depart Dubai at 1030hrs, arriving in Lagos at 1540hrs. The return flight EK 784 will depart Lagos at 1810hrs, arriving in Dubai at 0415hrs the next day. All flights can be booked on emirates.com, with OTAs and via travel agents.”

Last month, PREMIUM TIMES reported how the airline announced a suspension of flights to and from Nigeria until November 30.

The airline in a statement on its website said affected flight bookings had been cancelled.

Earlier in June, the airline announced a suspension of flights to and from Nigeria from June 21.

“In line with government directives, passenger flights to and from Nigeria (Lagos and Abuja) are suspended with effect from 21 June 2021 until further notice,” the airline said at the time. The directive came barely two days after the airline had announced resumption of flights to Nigeria after weeks of suspension.

Flights had been suspended in March over diplomatic row on COVID-19 protocols.

In its new directive, the airline said Covid-19 PCR tests are mandatory for all inbound passengers arriving to Dubai, including UAE citizens, residents and tourists, irrespective of the country they are coming from.

“Travellers coming from Nigeria must hold a negative Covid-19 PCR test certificate for a test taken no more than 72 hours before departure,” it said.

“Additionally, the Nigerian Centre for Disease Control (NCDC) has specified designated laboratories for passengers departing Nigeria and travellers must obtain their certificate from one of the labs listed here to be accepted on the flight. Travellers coming from Nigeria will also need to take another Covid-19 PCR test on arrival at Dubai International