For an agency that manages 22 commercial airports and handles millions of passengers each year, the Federal Airports Authority of Nigeria (FAAN) generates substantial amounts of money.
But a more difficult question has persisted: how much does the agency actually earn, and what happens to the money?
Over the past two years, FAAN has provided lawmakers with several glimpses into its finances, reports Daily Independent.
The figures show a significant flow of revenue, but they have largely emerged during parliamentary hearings, board retreats and industry events rather than through a single, routinely published and easily accessible annual financial statement.
That has fuelled calls for greater transparency over the agency’s earnings, particularly at a time when billions of naira are being committed to airport infrastructure and expansion.
Two Streams, One Agency
FAAN’s income broadly comes from two sources: aeronautical and non-aeronautical revenue.
Aeronautical revenue is generated from activities directly linked to aircraft and passenger operations.
These include landing and parking charges and the Passenger Service Charge (PSC), from which FAAN makes statutory remittances to agencies including the Nigerian Meteorological Agency and the Nigerian Safety Investigation Bureau.
Non-aeronautical revenue comes from commercial activities around airports. These include toll gates, car parks, rents, advertising, duty-free operations, concessions and other commercial facilities.
Aviation security expert and former Commandant of the Murtala Muhammed International Airport (MMIA), Lagos, Group Captain John Ojikutu (rtd), has argued that the revenue structure is much broader.
He has identified passenger terminal services, aircraft landing and parking, cargo operations, car parks, toll gates, fuel sales, car-hire operations, land and office rents, shopping malls, restaurants, check-in counters, aerobridges and VIP lounges among the various revenue-generating points available to FAAN.
In recent years, the authority has also placed greater emphasis on increasing its commercial earnings. FAAN’s Managing Director, Mrs Olubunmi Kuku, told a governing board retreat in Abuja in December 2025 that non-aeronautical revenue had increased by more than 50 percent since the current administration assumed office in December 2023.
At Mallam Aminu Kano International Airport, Kano, alone, FAAN reported revenue of more than N20.83 billion in 2024, exceeding its N17.3 billion target. The airport’s management attributed much of the growth to efforts to improve non-aeronautical revenue.
The Figures On The Table
Trying to establish FAAN’s overall financial performance, however, means piecing together figures disclosed on different occasions.
In December 2024, while appearing before the Senate Committee on Finance, Kuku disclosed that FAAN had remitted N218.3 billion in internally generated revenue and N352.2 million in stamp duty to the Consolidated Revenue Fund between 2020 and 2024. The annual remittances reportedly rose from N3.5 billion in 2020 to N112.8 billion in 2024.
At a Stakeholders Forum on Transforming the Aviation Industry, convened by Aviation Minister Festus Keyamo in Lagos in February 2025, Kuku provided another significant figure.
She said FAAN generated N343,870,721,789.31 between January and November 2024, representing an 82.5 percent increase over the corresponding period in 2023.
The figure is particularly striking because it covered only 11 months of the year. But another appearance before the House Committee on Finance produced a different number.
During a review of the agency’s 2023–2025 performance, lawmakers were told that FAAN generated N191.43 billion against an approved target of N292.93 billion.
That represented a shortfall of N101.5 billion, with the actual revenue amounting to about 65.35 percent of the target.
The committee was also told that airlines owed FAAN N25.86 billion in 2023, of which only 31.25 percent had been recovered.
Taken individually, the figures may cover different periods, revenue classifications or accounting bases and therefore are not necessarily contradictory. The bigger issue, however, is that the public is often left to reconcile them.
Rather than having one comprehensive annual statement showing what FAAN earned from each source, what it remitted, what it received from concessions and what it spent, the figures are often disclosed in response to questions from lawmakers or at industry engagements.
The Accountability Question
Ojikutu has been one of the most persistent critics of what he considers inadequate disclosure of FAAN’s earnings.
He has argued that the revenues of FAAN and the Nigerian Civil Aviation Authority are understated and that their actual annual earnings cannot easily be independently verified, even though government budgets are approved every year with assumptions about the agencies’ finances.
In an earlier assessment, Ojikutu compared FAAN’s projected 2022 revenue of N188 billion with the potential proceeds from just four aeronautical charges.
His contention was that those charges alone could theoretically produce substantially more, without taking into account revenue from other airport activities.
Early this year, he had again questioned whether the authority’s earnings reflected the scale of passenger and aircraft activity across Nigerian airports.
Speaking at an aviation forum, Ojikutu argued that revenue from Passenger Service Charges and landing and parking fees alone should not be less than N400 billion annually, using 2024 passenger and traffic figures as his basis.
His calculation excluded revenue from cargo operations, car parks, toll gates, rents and other commercial activities.
His argument is not necessarily that the difference represents missing money. Rather, it raises a fundamental question about how comprehensively the public can track the revenue generated from Nigeria’s airports.
Ojikutu has also advocated greater concessioning of FAAN’s commercial operations, arguing that the authority should concentrate more heavily on its core airport management, safety and security responsibilities.
He has cited Singapore’s Changi Airport, where airport-linked business parks, cargo logistics facilities, cold-chain infrastructure and hotels form part of a wider commercial ecosystem.
Other industry voices have also raised concerns about FAAN’s structure.
Wale Babalakin, Chairman of Bi-Courtney Aviation Services Limited, has criticised FAAN’s dual role as airport operator and regulator, arguing before the House Committee on Aviation that an operator should not simultaneously compete in a regulatory environment.
Abdulrasaq Saidu, Secretary- General of the Association of Nigeria Aviation Professionals, has also questioned the management of concessioned revenue points, claiming that about 90 percent of FAAN’s revenue points have been concessioned and calling for greater clarity on the financial arrangements.
Delivering a keynote address at the 29th Conference of the League of Airport and Aviation Correspondents (LAAC) in Lagos, last year, renowned economist, Bismarck Rewane, approached the issue from a broader economic perspective, arguing that government should concentrate on policy and regulation rather than directly running commercial businesses, while maintaining consistent policies capable of attracting private investment.
Spending Versus Earning
The debate becomes even more important when FAAN’s revenue is considered alongside government spending on airports.
The Federal Executive Council approved about N919 billion for a nationwide airport upgrade programme, including N712.2 billion for the reconstruction of Terminal One at the Murtala Muhammed International Airport in Lagos.
Lagos is widely regarded as FAAN’s biggest revenue-generating airport market, accounting for a substantial share of the authority’s earnings.
The cost of the Lagos terminal project alone is more than twice the N343.87 billion FAAN reported generating between January and November 2024.
Importantly, however, the project is being funded through the federal budget and should not be interpreted as money being spent directly from FAAN’s reported annual revenue.
Ojikutu has questioned the necessity of the reconstruction, arguing that the terminal could instead have been concessioned, in the manner of the MMA2 arrangement, freeing government resources for safety, security, infrastructure maintenance and manpower development.
The contrast is sharpened by the inconsistency displayed in government policies, following developments in Enugu. In June this year, the government handed the Akanu Ibiam International Airport over to Aero Alliance Limited under a 30-year public-private partnership, after the FEC approved the concession’s business case the previous August alongside the N712 billion MMIA vote. Ojikutu, however, questioned the double standard.
What Is Missing?
The emerging picture does not, by itself, establish that money is missing from FAAN’s accounts. What it does expose is a transparency gap.
FAAN’s revenue figures are substantial, but they are not always presented to the public in one consolidated, independently audited statement that clearly shows income from aeronautical charges, commercial operations, concessions, rents and other sources alongside expenditure and statutory remittances.
For an agency responsible for some of Nigeria’s most important economic gateways, that distinction matters. A single annual financial report, published routinely and containing a detailed breakdown of revenue sources, concession income, debts owed, statutory deductions, remittances and expenditure, would make it easier for lawmakers, industry stakeholders and the public to understand the authority’s financial position.
Until that happens, the question surrounding FAAN’s revenue will continue to be less about whether Nigerian airports generate substantial money and more about whether Nigerians can clearly see the complete journey of that money – from the passenger and aircraft operator who pays it to the account into which it ultimately goes.
