•As Ghana shines off Nigerian port as hub in West Africa
By Steve Agbota, [email protected]
With a coastline of 852 kilometres bordering the Atlantic Ocean in the Gulf of Guinea and a maritime area of over 46,000 sqkm, Nigeria is richly blessed as a maritime nation.
It also has fresh mangrove swamps, creeks, coastal rivers, estuaries, bays, and offshore waters. More so, eight out of the 36 Nigerian states, with 25 per cent of Nigeria’s total population, share the Atlantic Ocean coastline.
Despite its abundant resources embedded in its maritime sector to back its economic diversification and development drive, Nigeria is yet to take full advantage and harness enormous potential in the industry.
But 63 years after Nigeria gained independence, experts believe that the country only recorded some growth in the area of port reforms, which took place in 2006 where some portions of the ports were concessioned to private owners known as terminal operators.
But the nation’s maritime sector is still arguably, lagging behind in the comity of nations when it comes to ship ownership and maritime business due to lack of a proper legislative framework to drive the sector to economic prosperity.
The industry is advertently faced with some challenges and is still being held back by corruption, policy inconsistency, lack of national shipping lines and functional scanners across the nation’s ports as well as decaying infrastructure, which include; roads, rail, quay, buildings, equipment, and yard.
Daily Sun learnt that Nigeria is advantageously placed to benefit from maritime trade along the coast of West Africa and within the Gulf of Guinea region due to its enormous potential in the sector.
Ironically, stakeholders believe Nigeria has the potential to own, operate the biggest and most efficient ports in Africa because of its special geographic location and population of more than 200 million people. But, despite its enormous potential, the nation’s maritime sector is precariously still lagging behind many maritime nations.
For instance, Apapa Port was proposed to be the hub for cargo in West Africa but due to lack of a proper legislative regime, Port of Ghana today has taken that position of being the hub for cargo in West Africa.
Paradoxically, at 63, the lack of a national carrier to date after the collapse of the Nigerian National Shipping line (NNSL) in 1995, foreign vessels have continued to dominate its coastal waters.
The NNSL, which had about 20 vessels was liquidated with all its vessels gone and all effort to revive it failed when leading investors, Pacific International Lines, (PIL), pulled out of the deal.
Today, more than 80 per cent of indigenous shipping companies have equally gone under, swept away by the harsh tide of the inclement economic climate. All these are attributed to previous governments negligence and lack of legislative framework form the industry.
Speaking with Daily Sun, the Founder of the National Council of Managing Directors of Licensed Customs Agents, Mr. Lucky Amiwero, said that there has been very little development in the maritime industry.
He added that there are some gains when the port was reformed in 2006, saying but unfortunately, that reform did not take into cognizance the aspect of legislation.
“Legislation inspection was not legislated. As at now, we don’t have any inspection regime because when you look at it, pre-shipment inspection was cancelled but was not abrogated. Destination inspection was introduced but was not backed up by law as at today. What we have was normal inspection and other things that were done by Customs.
“Then, in 2007, Nigerian Maritime Administration and Safety Agency (NIMASA) Act was established.
That Act has been on but it has not generated anything. In 2003, Cabotage Act was introduced. All these things that were introduced have not generated anything.
“Instead of moving forward, we are moving backward. What they were supposed to do is to rejig the whole thing and make sure there is benefit to the economy. 63 years is not a joke! So we have been having a dull time in the maritime sector. When we are talking about maritime we are talking about the seaports.
“There was a reform that has not reflected in the economy, and the reform in 2006, changed mode of clearance. Electronic process was introduced where they have Webb Fountaine, scanner and the rest. But all those things were short-lived in 2014. “So we have a very confused port system, which has to be reformed completely. But the Customs and everything should be reformed if Nigeria wants to move within the dynamics of advanced economy. Otherwise, the industry will continue to slow down and move back,” he said.
Meanwhile, the Managing Director of Sula Marine Global Limited/foremost freight forwarder, Sulaiman Ayokunle, said: “The growth might not be exponential but at least, we have been able to witness some growth even though it is arithmetic in terms of very slow but at the time the port was concession to terminal operators, lots of other new things were introduced.
“Earlier, we talked about equipment when it was solely handled by Nigerian Ports Authority (NPA), there were some of the areas we are having challenges with equipment but some of the terminal operators, the businessmen were able to bring in some of equipment that are very important for cargo handling. In that regards, after the concessions, we are able to witness a kind of growth that is not just arithmetic, at least geometric perform,” he added.
He said that technology has added a lot into the management of terminals and ports.
Nigeria supposed to be the West African hub for cargo.
“There was a time there was a proposal that Apapa will be used as hub for West African countries and all the hinterland. But due to some negligence and the way we do things in Nigeria, they decided to shift it to Ghana and missed that narrowly but I believe that is not the end of it. We are still pushing hard to make sure that Nigeria is not left behind in terms of development in maritime sector, he said.
He said Nigeria needs to do a lot in the area of ease of doing business, duplication of activities by government agencies, saying there is need to streamline them.
A lecturer at the Nigerian Maritime University and also the Managing Director/CEO Kamany Marine Services Ltd, Charles Okerefe, said that so far, a lot has taking place in the industry, there is little bit of development but not much of growth because from very little beginning of NPA being on appendix of the Nigerian Railway Corporation (NRC).
“The Marine Department was under the NRC, we can say a lot has happened in terms of creation of different parastatals under the Ministry of Transport and now we have another Ministry calved out of the Ministry of Transport, which is the Ministry of Marine and Blue Economy.
“And overtime, there are developments in the Port from the initial harbours we have in the South-South such as places like Burutu, Sapele, and Warri. Now we have numbers of Ports dotting the whole nations like Calabar, Onne, Tin Can, Apapa and so on,” he added.
To a large extent, he noted that expansion has taking place but a lot still needs to be done in terms of key into the use of modern technology to drive not only the Ports but the maritime industry in general in terms of documentation, productivity at the Port, cargo handling, cargo evacuation and also the development of Inland Dry Port, which is the process meant to decongest the nation’s mainstream ports.
“These are things we need to be seen to ensure that we are inline with what obtained in the international atmosphere. So give and take, we cannot say that it has all been bad.
“A lot has taken place and a lot more needs to be there especially with the creation of the Ministry of Marine and Blue Economy, there is nothing yet on ground to show that the new Minister has started moving. We have to see actions, concrete steps being taking to give character and definition to the new ministry,” he explained.
However, the Secretary General of Merchant Seafarers Association of Nigeria, Captain Alfred Oniye, said the maritime industry in Nigeria has seen significant growth and development since the country’s independence 63 years ago.
He added that there is need for improvement in the area of policy consistency, empowerment of indigenous ship owners and infrastructure development.
“Overall, while there have been significant strides in the development of Nigeria’s maritime industry since independence, there is still room for improvement to ensure it reaches its full potential,” he said.