Nigerian aviation authorities have opened a new front in an ongoing dispute with Royal Air Maroc, escalating what has become one of the most public regulatory showdowns between the NCAA and a foreign carrier in recent memory.
The threat, delivered not through a formal press release but in a pointed post on X, marks a hardening of tone from an agency that says it has already given the Moroccan flag carrier every chance to correct course.
On December 28, 2024, the NCAA had sanctioned Royal Air Maroc alongside four other airlines, Air Peace, Ethiopian Airlines, Arik Air, and Aero Contractors, for breaching Part 19 of the NCAA Regulations 2023, the section governing consumer protection.
Royal Air Maroc subsequently paid the penalty imposed over the consumer protection violations in September 2025.
That payment, in the NCAA’s telling, was supposed to be the end of the matter. It wasn’t. According to Achimugu, having been sanctioned for the first time for consumer protection-related infractions in 2025, it is expected that there would be very major improvements in the way they attend to complaints from Nigerian passengers, improvements the regulator says never materialized.
In unusually blunt language for a regulatory official, Achimugu framed Royal Air Maroc as an outlier even among Nigeria’s troubled roster of international carriers.
He described the airline as having “for the longest time been the biggest culprit when it comes to baggage infractions, poor passenger handling, and extremely poor resolution processes when dealing with Nigerian passengers.”
A separate account of his remarks put it in similarly stark terms, with Achimugu saying Royal Air Maroc has remained the worst offender among international airlines operating in Nigeria in matters relating to baggage mishandling, passenger care, and the timely resolution of customer complaints.
The specific complaints follow a familiar pattern in airline consumer disputes: the airline frequently failing to promptly inform passengers about delayed baggage, neglecting to provide first-needs assistance consistently, and only addressing complaints after the NCAA intervenes.
Perhaps the most striking allegations in Achimugu’s account concern not customer service failures but the airline’s conduct toward the regulator itself.
He accused Country Manager Ahmed Boussouf of using geography to dodge accountability: “Royal Air Maroc’s country manager, Ahmed Boussouf, will sit in Lagos and refuse to attend meetings in Abuja,” he alleged, adding that “instead, the airline will hastily send an email on the eve of the meeting that the cases are being processed and, thereafter, send one Theophilus (their Abuja representative) without authority to resolve cases or make commitments.”
Matters reportedly came to a head on Thursday itself, when Achimugu says he confronted the pattern directly and got a curt reply.
“In registering our displeasure over this incessant disregard for Nigerian passengers and the authority, this country manager, Boussouf, said to me, ‘Whatever you want to do, do,'” Achimugu alleged, a remark he cited as proof of the airline’s contempt for the process.
Notably, Achimugu also worked to puncture any assumption that Royal Air Maroc holds a captive market on the Morocco route.
He noted that Nigerian travelers have alternative carriers on the Morocco route, including Air Algérie, EgyptAir, and Ethiopian Airlines, stressing that no airline should assume passengers have no choice.
It’s a pointed signal that the regulator sees suspension as a genuinely usable tool, not just leverage. Passengers, in his framing, would not be stranded without options.
As of publication, Royal Air Maroc has offered no public reply to any of the allegations. Given the specificity of the claims, including a direct quote attributed to its own country manager, the airline’s silence is likely to draw scrutiny of its own, particularly from Nigerian passengers already watching the dispute play out on social media rather than through official channels.
Whether the NCAA follows through on the suspension threat, or whether it produces the “commitment” Achimugu says he’s demanding, will be the next chapter to watch.
WHAT YOU SHOULD KNOW
Despite being sanctioned and fined in 2024/2025 for consumer protection violations, Royal Air Maroc reportedly showed no real improvement, leading the NCAA to now push for a full suspension of its Nigerian operations.
What tips this from a routine complaint into a serious escalation is the alleged conduct behind the scenes: a country manager accused of dodging regulatory meetings, sending representatives without decision-making power, and dismissively telling the regulator, “Whatever you want to do, do.”
In short, this isn’t just about delayed baggage anymore. It’s a regulator publicly signaling that an airline’s disregard for its authority, not just poor customer service, is what’s now on the line. Royal Air Maroc has yet to respond.
