Chief Isaac Jolapamo is the chairman of the Indigenous Shipowners Association of Nigeria (ISAN). Last week he spoke with maritime journalists in Lagos on a number of issues, including the hijack of his vessel; More Prosperity. Dapo Olawuni was at the media chat.
What are the security agencies doing about this case and where is the captain of the vessel?
Chief Isaac Jolapamo is the chairman of the Indigenous Shipowners Association of Nigeria (ISAN). Last week he spoke with maritime journalists in Lagos on a number of issues, including the hijack of his vessel; More Prosperity. Dapo Olawuni was at the media chat.
What are the security agencies doing about this case and where is the captain of the vessel?
We have contacted the person that chartered the vessel, but of course we are not an investigation outfit, the Nigerian Maritime Administration and Safety Agency (NIMASA) is investigating it, what we have asked them to do is to hand over the matter to the SSS or to the police that are better equipped. We have made a report to the EFCC and we are expecting NIMASA to hand over these people to the law enforcement agencies. I don’t know which agencies NIMASA intends to use. The captain is under lock and key with the navy, his name is Captain Adebanjo, and the crew on the ship are under NIMASA protection, we have written to NIMASA that they should be taken out of the ship because this is the only vessel we have left, so that we will be able to repair the vessel and be able to trade her. I cannot quantify how much it will cost to repair the ship now because I didn’t know the level of damage done to the engine yet, but my problem is that this is an industry that we should not allow to die, 80 percent of shipping companies have closed shop, I started with some people in 1985 and there is none of them left now, and when you look at it, all the people responsible for this are also the ones involved in oil subsidy scandal.
Has the chatterer been arrested, where is he?
He is not under arrest, it is the NIMASA that is supposed to do this, he has been invited but maybe he has no time yet, he is the guy that was involved in billions of subsidy scam and they are already on another one, we have been invited again to the EFCC in Abuja to come and explain whether our ships are used to do such voyages which we never did.
Do you suspect anybody in this highjack because it is made to look like a pirate attack?
It appears like a pirate attack, but I have information that the chatterer of the vessel invited the Captain before the ship left and that he even went offshore to go and talk to them, to induce the crew of the vessel to the point that they carried three drums of PMS on the ship to go out, so they knew what they were doing, even the supposed pirates who vandalized the vessel, who were on the ship for that long, were suppose to have come from Nigeria, they have a boat, we traced the vessel to the border of Lome and Ghana, but when they dropped the vessel they dropped it at deep offshore Escravos, and they would have left in their own boat, so it is an orchestrated something. I can understand that most of our seafarers today are disgruntled because of business, the ship owners that employed them cannot pay them, and the idle man is the devil’s workshop, so if a ship is being high jacked it must be somebody who is professionally competent to do so, they are Nigerians and not foreigners, we created the piracy situation for ourselves.
Is this man a regular chatterer? Secondly, is your indebtedness to the crew not the cause of this action?
He is not a regular chatterer, but you don’t necessarily need to have a regular charterer to have your ship chartered out if the normal things are followed. Indebtedness to the crew is not a license for criminality, if a ship is working and they are not paid, they have the right to go and ask for the vessel to be auctioned so that they will be paid, if they can’t get it done in Nigeria they can take the ship elsewhere, it is not enough excuse, the problem here is that people want to make quick money, they also have people that they are looking up to, these people have succeeded in crippling other people to get to the level they are now.
In view of this occurrence, how will you access Bareboat chartering in Nigeria?
I believe you are talking about the bareboat chattering which NIMASA is doing, my association, ISAN, did not support the bareboat charter registration, we did not support it because it is another means of doing what the foreigners are doing that we are shouting about, it is not a good idea, it will not make us to achieve what we want to achieve, that we want to achieve it, this year makes it 10 years since Cabotage started, and instead of growing we are reducing in size, I use to have six vessels 10 years ago, but I have been reduced to one and the one I am reduced to now has been attacked, every morning, the debt recovery agents of the banks keep disturbing me, should this happen? I am not trying to bring up sentiments, I am only crying for this country and for what will happen in the future. In my 27years in this business I have had more than 18 ships, I buy it to a stage that it is not economical to run and I sell, but I am saying that as at 10 years ago I had 10 vessels, but in the last four years I have purchased four vessels with over US$40Million, and I have not been able to pay the bank back a dime.
Is it that the environment is not good enough or the ships are not good enough?
We all know what the problem is, when we bought these vessels, they were trading in Europe, when they come here they hardly work, I had two ships working last year, one had two voyages while the other one had six voyages throughout the year, and for a ship to break even and you say you have made money and your bank can smile to you, that ship on voyage chatter is supposed to take three cargoes in a month, mine took two in one year and the other one took six in one year, how am I not going to have problems with the banks, and it cuts across, how will I pay the salaries of my staff, if I keep the crew on the ship I feed them, how will they feed their families and train their children to school? Are we not the ones creating piracy?
How many vessels were on the fleet of your members 10 years ago and what is the current position now?
I don’t have the figures right now but I can tell you that ISAN started with myself, Capt. Iheanacho and Capt Labinjo, I know that Capt. Labinjo has no working ship today, I know that Capt. Iheanacho’s vessel is depleted, I started with six vessels when we were starting ISAN and like I said, I added four during the period, but I have just one now, I know that other people are coming in, I know that we have a lot of members, but I don’t have these figures, it cannot even be relevant in the sense that there has been an explosion in the number of people coming into this trade, they have come to take the benefit of the trade, we may have increased in number but the practitioners can tell you that it is not real. It is very difficult to maintain a ship in class when you are not generating funds to do so, and the more reason why our vessels quickly go out of class, classification is also a condition of both the P&I, insurance, and the hull and machinery, if you fall short of one you are going to fall short of the other, but of course we have made appeal in the days of former DG, Dr Ade Dosunmu that our vessels that are out of class needs to be repaired so they should give us a soft loan like two to three years, we call it ship sustenance and repair subsidy, but we are still working on it even though there are funds that have been put aside for it in the last few years.
What is the relationship between your organization and NIMASA, are they helping?
ISAN has come a long way from out of the trenches, and we have attempted in such a way that we should have a working relationship to help the industry, but unfortunately some of these things are either met with brick walls or individuals and that is why we are where we are today, but I think there are still room for improvement.
Why has the CVFF not been disbursed and why has ISAN not asked questions?
I think they are still working on the CVFF disbursement, but I wouldn’t know how much the money is now, but as at our last AGM, in my statement I said we are still waiting for the CVFF to take off, the money has been sitting in the bank and we don’t know who has been taking benefit of it. We started well, we were fighting and we got to a point that we went to court and we started arresting vessels by ourselves, but we have been pauperized now that we cannot lift our fingers, the association has been pauperized now that we cannot fight, and what is expected of us is to keep fighting, so it is either we beg to get what is our right or we don’t get it at all.
Can we trace the decline to the poor implementation of Cabotage law?
We will continue to have poor implementation of Cabotage until we actually say we want our people to do it, either they are doing it right or wrong. Today I can leak it to you that one of the recommendations of the presidential committee on maritime is for Nigerians to be given first refusal option; they know that ISAN is becoming too powerful so they want to break the rank of ISAN so that it will not work. The recommendation of the committee also is for government to revert the trade policy; we hope if they do it, we hope if ISAN shipping line is given a national carrier status, it has been promised over a year ago, we hope it comes into reality. The main problem is that we have not accepted Nigerians to do the shipping trade, the problem is aggravated by all forms and shape of oil traders and brokers that we have, today there is no standard for being an oil trader, if the oil trading activities is streamlined then there could be some sanity especially in the tanker shipping trade, if Nigerians are given the first option of refusal, for instance, the NPA has published the location where all ships that are trans-shipping should stay, Navy now have a few small boats, if they are able to deploy these boats to these locations and they patrol the area on continual basis, then sanity will return to the industry.
Do you think the passage of the PIB will help matters?
We had the Cabotage and we did not see the impact, we have had the local content but we didn’t see the impact, so what is the PIB doing? We are not expecting any miracle to happen when it has not happened in the ones meant specifically to develop the trade, when you look critically at the PIB, it has been watered down to such an extent that it does make a difference, so we are not optimistic about what PIB will bring, we will rather work on getting the Cabotage to be more effective, the local content to be more effective, the local content is more effective in areas like engineering and so on, but not in shipping services.
What have you done about your vessel that was arrested and butchered by the Lagos state government?
My company is right to go to court but I need money to pay the lawyers to pursue the case, but here I am, the banks will not give me any money to do that, they hardly give me money to even feed now, if it could happen to me then what about the other ship owners.
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