Emirates Airlines has confirmed its return to operations in Nigeria starting October 1, 2024.

The airline disclosed this via its official X handle Thursday.

“We’re back, Nigeria! We’ll be resuming services to Lagos from 1 October 2024, and we can’t wait to offer unrivalled connectivity to Dubai and beyond to over 140 cities,” the tweet read.

The airline will be operating a daily service between Lagos State and Dubai, and will offer customers more choice and connectivity from Nigeria’s largest city to, and through, Dubai.

The naira depreciated to N1,550 against the dollar at the parallel section of the foreign exchange (FX) market on Wednesday.

The current FX rate signifies a decline of 1.95 percent from the N1,520/$ reported on May 13.

Currency traders, also known as street traders, in Lagos, quoted the buying rate of the local currency at N1,510/$ and the selling rate at N1,550/$ — leaving a profit margin of N40.

At the official window, the local currency appreciated by 4.21 percent against the dollar from N1,520.4/$ on May 14 to close at N1,459.02 on Wednesday.

According to FMDQ Exchange, a platform that oversees the official window, a dollar was sold as high as N1,593 and at a low rate of N1,401 during trading hours.

The daily foreign exchange market turnover was $289.14 million.

On May 14, the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) said foreign missions based in Nigeria use third parties to transact in foreign currencies.

Speaking during an interview, Wilson Uwujaren, EFCC’s acting director of public affairs, said the commission has a task force whose duty is to fight the abuse of the naira and discourage transactions in dollars within Nigeria — which is against the law.

The Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) has granted approval in principle (AIP) to 14 new international money transfer operators (IMTOs).

IMTOs carry out cross-border fund transfer services for individuals and entities residing abroad to recipients in Nigeria.

Approval in principle is a conditional acceptance of a proposal subject to meeting other requirements for final approval.

CBN granted the AIP amid plans to double foreign currency remittance flows through formal channels.

Hakama Sidi Ali, CBN’s acting director of corporate communications, spoke in Abuja on Wednesday.

Ali said the approval will help increase the sustained supply of foreign exchange in the official market by promoting greater competition and innovation among IMTOs to lower the cost of remittance transactions and boost financial inclusion.

“This will spur liquidity in Nigeria’s Autonomous Foreign Exchange Market (NAFEX), augmenting price discovery to enable a market-driven fair value for the naira,” she said.

Ali also said the move by the apex bank is a means of reducing the historical volatility in Nigeria’s exchange rate caused by external factors, such as fluctuations in foreign investment and oil export proceeds.

On April 20, Olayemi Cardoso, CBN governor, said the financial regulator collaborated with IMTOs to collectively commit to doubling remittance flows through formal channels into Nigeria.

“We’ve had very productive discussions with leading IMTOs where we collectively committed to doubling remittance flows through formal channels into Nigeria in the immediate short to medium term,” Cardoso said.

He said CBN has also set up a task force to address bottlenecks hindering flows through formal channels.