The Chairman of the National Fleet Committee, Mr Hassan Bello has said plans are on course to ensure that the National carrier comes to materialization soon.
Bello who is also the Executive Secretary of Nigerian Shippers’ Council (NSC) told Shipping Position Daily correspondent exclusively that the committee has been able to get pioneer status for tax exemption for the national fleet.
Recall that the Minister of Transportation; Mr Rotimi Amaechi had in 2016 set up a committee to work towards developing the blueprint for establishing Nigerian national carrier which will be operated by the private sector.
However, speaking with one of our correspondents over the weekend, Bello informed that the committee is working on removing the conditions that have made it difficult to have the national fleet while informing that the committee has also been able to get the pioneer status for tax exemption for the national carrier.
He further said that the committee is working with the Nigerian Investment Promotion Commission (NIPC), the Federal Ministry of Budget and the Nigerian Maritime Administration and Safety Agency (NIMASA) for the actualization of the project.
According to him " the national carrier is going on, have always told everybody that the national carrier is not like buying bread the National Carrier is like a five-year project.
"We have gotten the pioneer status for tax exemption now, we are looking for the conditions that makes it impossible to have national carrier removed first so from there we move on.
"We are also working with the NIPC, we are working with the Federal Ministry of Budget and of course NIMASA to ensure the feasibility of the project".
Bello further said the committee is on course and not it is under any pressure to deliver the project at all means, stating that the project is a five-year project and that the private sector must have a good operating climate and be incentivised to buy-in on the project.
He said the role of the government in the establishment of the fleet is to ensure that the laws and policies are in favour of indigenous ship owners.
"It's a five-year thing, even yesterday we had meeting with NIMASA and one of the international shipping companies mentioned this idea of coming into the National fleet and we told them what we are doing.
"Nobody is going to rush us because that is why the others failed, you can't have an adverse
operating climate, the private sector must be incentivised to come into that. because this is not a government project, the government will not put a kobo
"But the government must look at the laws, the policies; we want to change them.
"For example, we should have access to carrying our crude by CIF instead of FOB, but we have supporters like the local content, and we have the NNPC itself that is, for the first time giving indigenous people the capacity.
"We indeed have capacity but what we lack is opportunity" he concluded.
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