A Federal High Court in Abuja has thrown out another lawsuit by Air Peace Limited, ruling that the Federal Competition and Consumer Protection Commission has the legal right to probe consumer complaints about airline ticket prices.
Justice B.F.M. Nyako delivered the judgment on June 29, 2026. She said the FCCPC acted within its powers under the Federal Competition and Consumer Protection Act 2018 when it asked Air Peace for information in January 2025.
That request came after many passengers complained about steep domestic fare increases during the December 2024 holiday season.
This is the second win for the FCCPC against Air Peace in recent months. In April 2026, Justice James Omotosho also dismissed the airline’s challenge to the Commission’s authority to investigate complaints and issue summons.
Air Peace argued that the FCCPC could not look into airfare pricing unless the President first activated the price regulation sections of the FCCPA. The airline wanted the court to stop the Commission from investigating its ticket prices.
Justice Nyako disagreed. She ruled that asking for information was part of a lawful investigation under Sections 17, 32 and 33 of the FCCPA. She stressed that investigation is separate from price regulation.
The court noted that the FCCPC did not order Air Peace to cut fares, did not impose any pricing formula, and did not declare the airline’s prices illegal.
According to the judge, accepting Air Peace’s argument would mean the FCCPC could not investigate any pricing-related complaint unless the President first invoked Section 88. That, she said, would cripple the Commission’s core mandate and was not what lawmakers intended.
Reacting to the ruling, FCCPC Chief Executive Tunji Bello called it another affirmation of the Commission’s duty to look into market practices that hurt consumers or competition.
“The Court has again affirmed an important principle under the Act. Investigating consumer complaints is fundamentally different from regulating prices,” Bello said. “The FCCPC neither sought to fix nor regulate Air Peace’s fares. It simply exercised its lawful authority to obtain information as part of an investigation into a matter of legitimate consumer concern.”
Bello added that an investigation is only fact-finding. It is not a finding of liability, enforcement, or price control. He said the judgment also makes clear that any actual price regulation would still require a separate process under the FCCPA.
The Commission said it will continue to carry out its mandate fairly, transparently and in line with the rule of law.
