Gabon’s Afrijet calls for more competition to bring down price of flight ticket

Afrijet, Gabon’s only airline providing domestic flights, has called for more competition and tax reforms as part of the efforts to slash down the price of flight tickets.

“Dreaming of competition to be able to set prices is not according to this debate, but according to the reality of our costs! Like all economic actors, we are confronted with galloping inflation among our suppliers: aeronautical spare parts have increased by 7 to 10%, logistics costs to transport them have exploded, the CFA/US dollar parity has generated a 20% increase in our aircraft rents and the price of kerosene has doubled between January and July 2022,” Marc Gaffajoli, General Director of the airline told local media L’Union.

“If all these increases were reflected in our prices, believe me, they would be much higher. If there were competitors, we would not be accused of this bad intention… More seriously, we are not worried about competition, we live it on the regional network. Today, we serve Douala, Yaoundé, Malabo, Pointe-Noire, Brazzaville, Cotonou and soon Kinshasa and Sao Tome again. All these routes have or will have another airline operator. However, we are the preferred airline in terms of market share on this network,” he added.

Gaffajoli argued that the price of the ticket can be significantly reduced if the government brings down fees and taxes, the value-added tax (VAT) in particular.

An Afrijet domestic flight ticket costs around $74.