On February 25, 2011, the Maritime Industry Advocacy Initiative (MAIN) unveiled members of its advisory board to a select group of maritime journalists. The occasion afforded the board members the opportunity to espouse their take on certain industry issues and also affirm the commitment to the objectives of the NGO. This week, as a mark of honour to them, we bring you excerpts of the media interaction. They are: Mr Ferdinand Agu (chairman), Otunba Kunle Folarin, Prince Olayiwola Shittu and Mrs Shade Lawal.
On February 25, 2011, the Maritime Industry Advocacy Initiative (MAIN) unveiled members of its advisory board to a select group of maritime journalists. The occasion afforded the board members the opportunity to espouse their take on certain industry issues and also affirm the commitment to the objectives of the NGO. This week, as a mark of honour to them, we bring you excerpts of the media interaction. They are: Mr Ferdinand Agu (chairman), Otunba Kunle Folarin, Prince Olayiwola Shittu and Mrs Shade Lawal.
Ferdinand Agu
“We Are All Dedicated To Serve Our Country And Serve The Industry”
At least, we all share the distinction that we are all stakeholders in the same industry; it’s a family affair as the PDP people will say. The difference is basically that we are lucky to have Sesan bring out so much of his own time and we are indeed privileged to have Mrs. Lawal, Prince Shittu, and Otunba Folarin coming out from their busy schedule to say that let us all put heads together and be there as resource persons and the vissioners for an industry group, to attempt to sharpen the focus of the industry. A lot of people are already working on that, we are not doing anything that has not been done before. But we are saying that we’ll like to sharpen the focus, to task ourselves, to sit back and re-conceptualize our maritime industry with a view not necessarily to challenge what exists, but to add value to what exists, that is where we are. We have briefly looked at the state of the industry; we have taken an overview of the structures that man the industry; both in the public sector and in the private sector. We have also looked at the potentials of the industry and the necessity to have a mechanism that will bring these potentials to fruition; that is where we are. We don’t have all the answers, but we definitely have all the commitments. We look forward to working closely together, we may not always agree, but when we do disagree, let it be based on points of principle, there are issues that you may think are industry interest and we may not agree to be in industry interest and vice –versa, but the most important thing, I think is that we are all dedicated to serve our country and serve the industry. Thank you very much.
How to cause a change in the present state of things in the maritime industry:
I think you are basically asking how we think we can catalyse change in the current state of the maritime industry, so the operating word there is – Catalyzing. We are not saying that we are going to do; we don’t have the authourity and we are not assuming the function of doing, but we can catalyze as an advocacy group, we can catalyze a re-conceptualization in the maritime sector and I think there are three broad areas you’ll like to look at; the first is that a lot of things exist in government programme, but they are not firm as government priorities. There is no doubt that the maritime sector is a very important part of government programme. What any advocacy group will like it to be is for it to become a priority in the government programme not just the programme. And when I say priority, without roughing any feathers, I want you to listen to the campaigns of all the 21 candidates for the post of presidency between now and April and you as press men take a sectarian breakdown of the commitments that they make and come and then let us evaluate; is the maritime industry a real government priority? 21 candidates are in the field covering the length and breadth of the country, in 45 days or less, we shall bring this campaign to an end, we can do a content analysis of their commitments, of what they promise, of what people asked them to promise. Then, let us look and see, if we break it down sectorally, has this industry really been accorded priority. There is a programme, no doubt, but is it the priority? Now, if it should be the priority, who will make it the priority? In a civil dispensation, how does a matter become a priority? It becomes a priory by people like you and I pointing out and saying: look at the roles it plays in our life and look at why it is more important and look at how you’ll do it. I am not pointing the finger of blame at the politician or at anybody; I am saying it is what we together do to make it a priority. That’s number one, when it becomes a priority, the issue is: do we have a niche, what is our area of competitive or comparative advantage. You guys have been in the industry for a long time; you have heard talks about ship building, ship repair, crewing, port operations, and regulatory activities e.t.c. Do we have a maritime niche? Your answer is as good as mine. And those nations that we call maritime nations are maritime nations because they have a niche. Between Korea, Japan and China; they account for 80% of the new buildings in the world. Singapore is the leader in port management; Philippine is the leader in crewing. We call them maritime nations because they have niches, do we have one? So I think we shall all put heads together and say can we all as stakeholders arrive at the area of competences and then see whether we can a create a niche, and that’s when we can become a maritime nation. And finally is the sector sufficiently integrating with the rest of the economy? You’ve been in the media for quite a long time, I know that when I worked around this area as DG, every other day, there is a splashing of headline news in newspapers here and there, it doesn’t cross Mile 2, they just die there. How many offices have you gone and you’ll see a maritime publication on the table in Abuja? You’re press men; you go around, how many offices have gone on the (Lagos) Island and see any of our magazines on their table? When was the last time that an issue critical to us was a national issue? The last thing I can think is about the Cabotage, port – concessioning was screaming. So that is what an advocacy group will try to do, to work with all of us, to make our issues the national issue, define our area of advantage, what we call a maritime niche, ensure that we are not just a government programme, but that we are part of the government priority.
OTUNBA KUNLE FOLARIN
“I believe that this group will stand as a reservoir of ideas to move the maritime industry forward”
I will just make inputs to what he (Agu) has said. He has given a king of road map to what the group is and what we’ll like to achieve. But of course we are looking at it from a perspective of maritime industry initiative. What are we to look at here? We have to look at comparative situations all over the world, the new ideas in dealing with critical issues; a lot of issues have been around in the maritime sector for a long and they remain unsolved – capacity building for example, development of subsidiary industries either in ship- building or ship repair. There are quite a few issues; like maritime security and safety, there had been agencies of government who are mandated to deliver on these issues, but then we as an advocacy group will like to highlight these issues and emphasize where they interface with government objectives and also to be able to bring initiatives in the discussions and to focus attentions to those critical issues that we think had the commanding height of Nigeria’s maritime interest. I deliberately choose the word Nigeria maritime interest because you can just imaging the resources that we have ; over 900miles of coast line, I don’t think any country in West Africa has got that, 572km of inland water-ways in Nigeria alone. Again, people have said that the Nigerian maritime sector is next to oil and gas; we have not articulated clearly what we mean by that, you must be very graphic and be able to come up with figures. Those maritime resources can become an economic agenda. The chairman (Ferdinand Agu) has just highlighted some issues by saying geo-politically, some regions in the world have taken advantage of certain resources in the global maritime sector, Nigeria must also come out and say we have a maritime sector, where do we have comparative advantage. So when a group, apart from those in government is able to articulate this and come out with data and probably a road map on how to get there, this may not engage a mind of bureaucrats. For example, a little digression, the western are trying to circumvent African routes because of the piracy in the Indian Ocean and when this happens the freight to Nigeria will have to be coming through Mediterranean and through the west coast. Suddenly you will find out that the freight cost rises. So this NGO can focus ideas and direct government attention to the happenings in the world. Are we aware that shipping lines might now decide that Nigeria is no longer a suitable destination because of the long route and inability of the region to afford a higher freight cost? All my life, I have been in the maritime industry and I don’t know whether I will leave it, so the consequences or whatever happens to the sector affects me personally and my country, so I take it as a kind of assignment for me to follow up the happenings in the maritime industry. When we have piracy and it doesn’t affect Nigerian ships and it does not come to this region, we ignore it without knowing that there are consequences of whatever is happening there. So we must look at the globalised effects of maritime events from all countries. There are so many issues that will come up. I believe that this group will stand as a reservoir of ideas to move the maritime industry forward.
PRINCE OLAYIWOLA SHITTU
“This NGO Will Surely Be Able To Say What Is Right And What Is Expected Of Government Either In Policy- Making Or In Implementation”
I count myself lucky to have found myself in the midst of gurus of the maritime industry who are on the board of this NGO. I will want to take my contributions from another perspective, Nigeria is an import- dependent economy and all we do is to import, meanwhile the maritime industry itself has not gotten it right. Nigeria cannot isolate itself from the global village, and we all know that something is wrong with us. Is the Nigerian maritime industry at par with the maritime industries in other West African countries, whereas it should have been the leader? We are finding it difficult to even get out of the personal initiatives of individuals on what will happen at a particular time without looking at what will happen to the Nigerian maritime industry in a decade, even among those who are elders in the maritime industry that are here today, none of them can forecast what will happen to the industry in a decade, how much more in two or three decades. Now can we ask ourselves: now that the federal government is tumbling and struggling trying to get the energy sector right so that our power supply can be steady enough for the industries to spring up so that we can start producing for export again. What will happen to the maritime industry when we get to that stage, if we start looking at the maritime industry in the next decade, and we believe and pray and have faith that the energy crisis that Nigeria has been going through will improve and we get out of the problem, and there are factories springing up, and we become an exporting nation, how can the maritime industry cope? So this NGO has come at the right time to help thinkers and not doers, because doers in Nigeria are doers for certain interest, very few doers in Nigeria has ever done it for the future when they are no longer there, but the thinkers, those that can continually talk on our behalf, those who have the ability to get to the corridors where decisions and policies are being made, they can derive these abilities to make the right decisions from what this advocacy can do, and it is not too soon to start the job. I can assure you that with the support that I am seeing from our elders in the industry, this NGO will surely (without control from government) be able to say what is right and what is expected of government either in policy- making or in implementation. There are so many things that are wrong with us and we all agree that something is wrong with us, and we all agree that we must have a solution to it, but the solution comes from different angles and in so many colours, from different routes and it is cacophony of sounds, that sound is drowned on his own by personal interest. Our problem in this country is our personal interests, what do I have to gain, ministers have come and gone and we refer to them in the past, and you ask yourself what they have contributed, but don’t forget that ministers are politicians. One of the greatest disservice to this maritime industry today is that there is no body in the federal ministry of transport today that is more than three years old in the ministry, the oldest has just retired; which is Mrs. Ezenwa, the permanent secretary is less than three to four months old, all the other people transferred into the ministry are people coming in two to three years, so we don’t have people with knowledge for continuity of policies and these are parts of the things we need to look at. Civil servants are taken to the ministry of transport, but the salary is not as lucrative as what they expect, if the DG NIMASA is not allowing them to have a contract somewhere they will find their way to be transferred to more lucrative ministries, nobody is thinking of taking a carrier and looking at what we can do for the maritime industry.
The maritime industry alone is enough to be the revenue earner for this country; if well enhanced, but the oil business have so beclouded us as easy money, and even the oil business itself is not well managed because those who come to drill the oil here do not even tell us the truth because we rely on them to give us statistics. In my own constituency which is freight forwarding and which all of you know has been very notorious, you know how well have we thrived since I came into office to refocus and change the attitude of our people and bring in professionalism so that we can act like others elsewhere. It is an enormous task that is going to challenge everyone, but I can assure you that we are going to cooperate with the executive director; Sesan Onileimo, because he is a man whom we know as being well focused, and I can tell you that we have resolved collectively to do our best in this new efforts so that we will know that this is part of the contributions that we have made for this industry in years to come.
MRS SHADE LAWAL
“The Wealth Of This Nation Is Very Dependent On Attention To The Maritime Sector”
I want to say that the NGO will be the platform for the change that is desired in the maritime industry, it will be used to analyze, articulate, develop and position Nigeria in its rightful place; both in terms of development, with utmost integrity. The NGO will be the platform to focus the practitioners and the policy makers to realize that the wealth of this nation is very dependent on attention to the maritime sector, and among the many things that the NGO will do is to have a mental re-evolution and mental re-orientation for everybody to stand up and make a change, taking decisive actions that things must be done right. The NGO will also seek persuasively for human capital development so that the right people are placed in the right places. If we are able to promote good governance and the development of the maritime sector, most of the actions on millennium development goals as regards taking the country out of poverty, because a lot of problems in this country is not just about wealth seeking in the oil and gas, the maritime industry of any nation is a total industry. This NGO shall focus attention on all these issues to ensure that the industry gets its rightful place.
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