Nigeria’s Federal Government has signed a concession agreement for Akanu Ibiam International Airport in Enugu, a major commercial city in south-east Nigeria, as it moves to improve airport facilities through public-private partnership arrangements.
Okay News reports that the agreement was confirmed in a statement issued on Friday, 23 January 2026, by the Federal Ministry of Aviation and Aerospace Development, the government ministry responsible for aviation policy and oversight in Africa’s most populous country.
According to the statement, representatives of the Enugu State Government, the Federal Airports Authority of Nigeria (FAAN), and the concessionaire, Aero Alliance, attended the signing.
Nigeria’s Minister of Aviation and Aerospace Development, Festus Keyamo, said the signing ended what he described as a lengthy process that began several years ago and moved through different approval stages.
“Today is the end of a very long and tedious process regarding the concession of the Enugu Airport,” the minister said, adding that the process reached a key decision point on Thursday, 31 July 2025, when the Federal Executive Council, Nigeria’s top federal cabinet body, approved the proposal, subject to contract terms being completed.
Keyamo said that after the Federal Executive Council’s approval, the ministry, FAAN, and Aero Alliance entered negotiations and also consulted with aviation unions, with an emphasis on protecting workers’ interests.
“We did these agreements with the rights and privileges of workers uppermost in our minds,” he said. “Let me say today that we have fully respected and preserved the rights of aviation workers. They have not been retrenched, their terms and conditions of employment have not changed in any way, and they remain workers of the Federal Government and FAAN.”
He added that job security was a major part of the concession framework, saying the workers “have not been short-changed in any way at all” and that their jobs were “safe and protected.”
The minister also noted that while the main concession agreement had been signed, some practical steps linked to implementation were still to be resolved. He said two remaining issues involved security fees and the airport’s financial model, and he stated that the matters would be addressed in the coming weeks.
Officials described the signing as an important milestone for the Enugu airport, saying the goal is to improve efficiency, strengthen service delivery, and enhance passenger experience.
The Enugu concession is part of a wider aviation reform agenda by Nigeria’s Federal Government aimed at attracting private investment, upgrading infrastructure, improving regional connectivity, and boosting the country’s competitiveness in the aviation sector.
Earlier in 2025, the aviation ministry said discussions around concession plans for Enugu and other airports, including those in Lagos, Nigeria’s commercial hub, and Port Harcourt, the capital of Rivers State in the oil-producing Niger Delta region, were still being reviewed. The ministry said proposals from interested firms, including different durations and financial models, were being assessed by the Infrastructure Concession Regulatory Commission (ICRC), Nigeria’s federal agency that oversees public-private partnership processes, before final approval by the Federal Executive Council.
In general terms, a concession is a public-private partnership arrangement in which a private operator manages, maintains, and upgrades airport facilities for an agreed period, while ownership remains with the government. The model is often used to bring in private funding and technical expertise to improve infrastructure and services.
