DUBAI: The national United Arab Emirates carrier, Emirates Airlines, said it would maintain Dubai as the company's only hub. A spokesman for the airline said that all flights would go through Dubai, even as the carrier had looked at other cities as a potential hub to increase flights globally. “Emirates do not operate a multi-hub model. Our operations are routed through our home base in Dubai, where we link over 130 points on our international network with smooth and convenient connection times," the spokesperson said. Recently Jean-Luc Grillet, senior vice president commercial operations Africa told Standardbusiness that Emirates plans to have a hub in Harare to expand its footprint into Southern Africa. “Harare could be an interesting hub in the future. From Harare you are close to destinations such as Mozambique. You are not far from Botswana and Namibia. “There is real geographic potential of improving the development of the route. The market is growing fast," Grillet said. But the Emirates spokesperson said such plans were not in place. The spokesperson said the Zimbabwean and Zambian “markets are important for Emirates and in recent years we have continuously expanded our capacities out of these markets." BN
