Umar who recently presented the new policy guidelines to maritime stakeholders in Lagos, explained that it is an effort to correct the numerous anomalies observed in the Cabotage Law, especially as regards the powers of the Minister is granting waivers.
But this did not come as cheering news to ship owners present at the presentation who lambasted President Goodluck Jonathan for not having any concrete plan for the maritime sector. Chief Isaac Jolapamo, chairman, Nigerian Shipowners Association (Nisa), who spoke for the members of the association demanded that the waiver clause be expunged from the Cabotage Act, pointing out that the fresh guidelines is not a priority.
However insisting that the new guideline must be implemented, Umar noted that even though the powers granted to him were clearly spelt out in the subsisting laws, he regreted that certain inadequacies have been noticed which needed correction. "We do realize that in the cause of implementing this Act, a number of inadequacies have been observed and recorded, therefore we felt that it was necessary to call the attention of stakeholders, to come and rub minds and look at a draft policy guideline that we have brought out, so that together we will have a better working document. I have however considered it imperative to increase substantially, the tariff payable particularly for the manning waivers as a means of discouraging ship owners engaging foreign crew to man Cabotage vessels while local seafarers are left to wallow in penury" he said
In an effort to sale the guideline to the stakeholders, Barrister Calistus Nwabueze, executive director of maritime labour and cabotage services of the Nigerian Maritime Administration and Safety Agency (Nimasa) pointed out that, contrary to what obtains before, any ship that needs a waiver must have applied for it sixty days ahead of the arrival of the vessel. "The Cabotage services department shall within a period of 48 hours of receipt of waiver application, cause a notice of Cabotage waiver application to be published in the agency's website. The said publication shall request for notifications of objections to be made within 7days", he stated.
Apart from the compulsory payment of the two percent Cabotage contract surcharge, the new guideline also stressed the mandatory employment, training and utilization of Nigerian Seafarers, as well as the maintenance and repair of vessel in Nigeria during the period covered by the waiver.
Not swayed by the sweet talk, Chief Jolapamo whose opinion was shared by majority of the stakeholders present, pointed out that issuing a new guideline is not the priority for now. "The stakeholders already know that maritime development is not on the agenda of the present administration, the bottom line here is that a law that has been around for 10 years and it’s not working, the guideline is not a priority, our priority today is a maritime reform that will show that this government is sincere in developing the sector. The aviation sector is not as important as the shipping sector, yet they are given every attention", he pointed out.
Stakeholders at the forum demanded that government should set up a task force or maritime sector reform that will not talk of granting waivers after 10 years, but work for the removal of the waiver clause. "If we continue to have the waiver, we will continue to have the same problem, today, our members have in excess of US$3Billion as bad debts in Nigerian banks alone, 50 percent of us are out of business, we need to go back, for some of us to keep standing, you need to do more", Jolapomo told the bewilded minister.
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