The Nigerian Ports Authority (NPA) has denied responsibility for movement of the over 4,000 overtime containers currently littering the Lagos ports to the Government Warehouse at the Ikorodu Lighter Terminal.
General Manager, Monitoring and Regulatory Services of NPA, Mrs Ugo Madubuike stated this at a meeting last week with officials of the National Association of Government Approved Freight Forwarders (NAGAFF).
Madubuike who represented the Executive Director, Marine and Operations, Mr Sekonte Davies at the meeting, however assured that the agency is already working to ensure that the numerous overtime cargoes littering Lagos port are moved to the Ikorodu in other to decongest the port.
She declared that evacuating the overtime cargoes to Ikorodu is not profitable to the NPA because it earns no revenue after moving the overtime cargoes.
She said, "the agency is already looking at how to move the overtime cargoes from the port, but I must say that it is not in the interest of NPA to move overtime cargoes to government warehouse"
"What we want is to see that importers clear their goods as soon as they arrive the port and not waiting for it to become overtime before moving it to government warehouse”.
"What the agency gets from clearing of goods at the port is more than saying we want to move overtime cargo to one government warehouse, that was not the intention at the beginning, in fact we even spend more by moving this overtime cargoes to the Ikorodu Lighter terminal government ware house", she told the NAGAFF delegation.
She therefore urged the association to seek alternative ways on how to make the Ikorodu port an economic hub.
"Overtime cargo should not be the only source of revenue at Ikorodu, as freight Forwarders, I want you to think outside the box and look at ways at which Ikorodu can be more vibrant, how do you think Ikorodu can attract more cargoes thereby making it an economic hub", she added.
Speaking earlier, Chairman of Ikorodu Chapter of NAGAFF; Mr. Obinna Okafor appealed to NPA to revive businesses at the Ikorodu Lighter terminal, through prompt transfer of all overtime cargoes currently littering Lagos ports.
The association urged NPA to ensure quick transfer of cargoes that have stayed more than 90 days as stipulated by the law in order to help importers that still wish to clear their goods.
He noted that the Lagos ports were currently littered with overtime containers thereby making ease of doing business difficult at the port.
Okafor appealed to NPA to ensure that all overtime containers which the consignees were ready to take delivery of, through their respective freight forwarders are expressly transferred to lkorodu Lighter Terminal government warehouse.
He acknowledged that, in moving the cargoes, the Nigeria Customs Service will require the assistance of the NPA.
"Also in our engagement with Customs, they made us understand that they don't have facilities to move overtime cargoes from the ports, we will need the support of NPA, in ensuring that overtime cargoes that have spent above the days specified by law be moved to Ikorodu lighter terminal warehouse to keep Ikorodu port moving, he pleaded.
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