European airlines strengthen presence in African market

European airlines, which already carry the lion’s share of international passenger traffic to and from Africa, are continuing to make significant in-roads into the African air transport market. This penetration has had contrasting consequences for several African airlines. Some are benefitting from their link-up with much stronger foreign carriers, while others view the encroachment with concern.

Recent developments which have raised eyebrows in some quarters include: 

South Africa: The sight of Comair aircraft operating on domestic and regional routes in Southern Africa in the livery of British Airways – and its staff in BA uniforms – has set alarm bells ringing at South African Airways, in particular. BA is a fierce rival of SAA on the busy UK-South Africa route and the marketing agreement between the UK airline and privately-owned Comair has resulted in Comair feeding domestic and regional traffic straight onto BA’s flights to the UK and beyond. SAA has protested to the aviation authorities in South Africa, apparently to no avail. 

Meanwhile, Virgin Atlantic Airways’ intention to bid for a shareholding in Sun Air, the small Government-owned South African airline, poses a further threat to SAA. Like Comair, Sun Air currently feeds traffic away from SAA and directly onto the aircraft of its UK airline partner, Virgin. But while SAA stands to lose, Comair and Sun Air stand to gain from their link-up with BA and Virgin, respectively.

Zimbabwe: Just as Air Zimbabwe is recovering from the consequences of industrial action by its pilots, British Airways has announced that it is introducing a fourth frequency between London-Harare, Air Zimbabwe’s key route. The effect of this will be to further squeeze Air Zimbabwe when it is in a weakened state. 

Zambia: Following KLM’s purchase of a 26% stake in Kenya Airways, it is terminating its services to Lusaka, Zambia. Instead, Kenya Airways has won permission to double its weekly frequencies to Lusaka from two to four. Two of these flights from Lusaka to Nairobi dove-tail with KLM’s services from Nairobi to Schiphol, Amsterdam. Kenya Airways is thus expanding its regional services, as well as helping to feed traffic onto both its own and KLM’s long-haul flights. 

Aero Zambia, the de facto flag-carrier of Zambia, operates two frequencies a week between Lusaka and Nairobi and was not pleased that Kenya Airways’ additional frequencies almost paralleled its own flights to Nairobi. Aero Zambia is understood to have complained to the Zambian Ministry of Transport which subsequently told Kenya Airways not to parallel the frequencies of the privately-owned Zambian airline. 

Namibia: Lufthansa German Airlines is operating services between Frankfurt and Windhoek, Namibia, some of which ‘parallel’ those of Air Namibia. This has put undue pressure on the Namibian flag-carrier, which lacks the marketing muscle and more modern aircraft operated by the German airline. 

Nigeria: The launch of KLM’s new service from Amsterdam to Port Harcourt, Nigeria, is good news for international passengers who wish to fly directly to the heart of Nigeria’s busy oil industry. But it is potentially bad news for Nigeria’s privately-owned airlines, in particular, for whom the Lagos-Part Harcourt-Lagos service has been a bread-and-butter route. 

These and other developments are likely to concentrate the minds of African airline executives in the months ahead.