Virgin Nigeria Stake For Sale

Well it looks like SRB is selling his stake in Virgin Nigeria after getting kicked out of the International Terminal. Story here: http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/ceb26f6e-6e17 ... fd18c.html

Is this another example of an African government making the rules up as it sees fit? No wonder they're known as the third world.

Miopyk[8D]

[RichardMannion]

Good riddance I'd say - a sizeable loss made in the process I presume too.

I quite agree. Although perhaps the money raised from the sale could be used to update the interiors of the LGW a/c?!

I thought that VS were tied into the VK arrangement for 10 years or something. I am guessing that the Nigerian Government have broken their side of the contract and thus VS can walk away.

I would imagine that SQ are breathing a huge sigh of relief. SQ made it fairly public that one of the main reasons they were looking at selling their 49% stake in VS was due to the problems with VK. One must wonder how much of this is due to SQ putting pressure on VS to dump VK and the Nigerian government have provided them with the perfect reason.

IMHO it always was a bit of an odd set up. The opeartion of LON-LOS by two Virgin branded companies seemed a bit strange. This coupled with VS' clear lack of interest in helping VK get a brand that represented the Virgin Group well (poor a/c choices/lack of a Virgin esque product/ no use of LGW CH etc etc) showed that maybe SRB yet the positive PR of investing in Nigeria get ahead of what was best for the Virgin brand.

Is a real shame for Nigeria as they deserve a decent international carrier, LOS after all has an impressive arrangement of international carriers serving it (KL, VS, BA, EK, DL, QR, AF etc).