By Adeleye Ajayi
A giant stride towards realising the objectives of port reform was taken by the Federal Government with the ejection of nine out of 14 government agencies at the seaports last year.
The Minister of Finance, Dr Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, acting on the presidential directive, ordered the ejection of these agencies out of the ports to make the six-year old port reform work.
The directive affected the National Agency for Food and Drug Administration and Control, the Standards Organisation of Nigeria, the Quarantine Services and other agencies of government.
The National Drug Law Enforcement Agency (NDLEA) was also affected, but was later directed to go back to the ports.
The presidential directive was part of efforts to streamline port operations and make service delivery at the seaports more efficient, cost effective and user-friendly.
The agencies that were retained at the ports include the NPA, Nigeria Customs Service, Port Health Services, NIMASA, Port Police Command, State Security Service and Nigeria Immigration Service.
Mr Olayiwola Shittu, the National President of the Association of Nigerian Licensed Customs Agents (ANLCA), said that the ejection of the agencies was in order.
Shittu said the agencies had created bottlenecks in the clearing procedures.
Chief Boniface Aniebonam, Founder of National Association of Government Approved Freight Forwarders (NAGAFF), however, expressed displeasure over the sack and urged government to review the directive.
Aniebonam said the directive would have adverse consequences of delaying clearance of regulated products that might need the attention of some of the evicted agencies as well as opening the ports to indiscriminate importation of harmful products.
Also worrisome in the maritime industry is the problem of armed robbery and piracy attacks in Nigerian waters.
Mr Ziakede Akpobolokemi, Director-General of NIMASA, said that the menace of sea piracy was costing Nigeria not less than N443 million annually.
This estimate was based on the amount lost to sea robbery and piracy attacks between February 2010 and February 2011 in Nigerian territorial waters.
Akpobolokemi said that not less than 102 armed sea robbery attacks and other related incidents were reported in the period.
He said that the attacks, which claimed about 80 lives with Lagos accounting for 45 of the reported attacks, were mostly reported from Lagos, Bonny, Calabar, Port Harcourt and Warri pilotage districts.
The NPA has been removing the wrecks that have posed problems to navigation in the Lagos waters.
Besides removing the wrecks and the derelicts, the NPA has embarked on dredging of the channels to ensure that bigger vessels visit the seaports without any hitch.
The Managing Director of NPA, Alhaji Omar Suleiman, said the authority had made remarkable progress in dredging since the inception of the ports concession programme.
Experts have expressed mixed feelings over the move to resuscitate the national carrier and the process of handing over the Nigeria Unity Line (NUL) to a manager company.
Mr Olu Akinsoji, a former Government Inspector of Ships and former Sole Administrator of Maritime Academy of Nigeria , Oron, Akwa Ibom, said that the resuscitation of NUL would support growth of the nation’s shipping industry.
Mr Val Usifoh, Chairman, Shipping Association of Nigeria, advised that government should not hand over the defunct national carrier to any indigenous group or individual company.
“It will be a huge mistake for the Nigerian Maritime Administration and Safety Agency and government to hand NUL to an indigenous group or individual company,” Usifoh said.
The Nigerian Shippers Council is also making efforts to ensure speedy completion of Inland Container Depots, otherwise known as dry ports in the six geo-political zones of the country.
The Abia State Government has affirmed its commitment to partner with the council to ensure the speedy realisation of the ICD at Isiala-Ngwa North Local Government.