ITS USD 44 FROM DAR TO LONDON
When readers will set their incredulous eyes on this article the special introductory offer by British Airways for a limited number of seats from Dar es Salaam to London will have passed, as it is only valid from June 06th until June 09th inclusive, end of business day. The bombshell fare was launched yesterday on the occasion of British Airways finally introducing a fourth flight between the UK and Tanzania, where other airlines in particular from the Gulf region have long gone daily and more.
The airline was hastily adding that anyone missing on this very special and throw away fare – SUBJECT of course to taxes and regulatory fees which alone runs into a great multiple of the fare itself – could then take advantage of a USD 444 fare on offer until June 20th end of business day and outbound travel completed by June 30th.
These fares will get passengers a seat in economy class, while related offers for the economy ‘Plus’ section will sell at USD 888 and club class fares at USD 2.144.
And as an aside – while European Airlines have of late mouthed off in frustration about the inroads Gulf carriers have made around the world, consider this: Emirates, Qatar and Oman have in past years all upped their frequencies, including some of them connecting Zanzibar directly, as they have incidentally done across the Eastern African region and much of the continent. All this happened while some major European airlines are either absent from the East African skies like Lufthansa or use ‘family members’ like Brussels Airlines and Swiss to cover the region and erstwhile global giants like British Airways still don’t fly daily into Entebbe and only now move from three to four flights per week to Dar es Salaam. Maybe here lies the problem of exactly why Gulf airlines have become crowd favourites over here, and in many parts of the world – they go daily or even double daily, traffic rights permitting, offer impressive services on the ground and in the air and have simply left many of the traditional airline power houses trailing in their wake. And this too should be remembered, there is something called wake turbulence which seems to have affected those coming right behind the leaders.
Fodder for thought.
