About four years after it abandoned the Badagry, Lagos campus of the Maritime Academy of Nigeria, the Nigerian Maritime Administration and Safety Agency (NIMASA) may have started exploratory work on the establishment of yet another academy.
Sources close to the agency confirmed to Shipping Position Daily yesterday that the new location is Escravos in Delta state and that a top delegation from the agency left Lagos yesterday for Delta state to physically inspect and probably take possession of the new site.
About four years after it abandoned the Badagry, Lagos campus of the Maritime Academy of Nigeria, the Nigerian Maritime Administration and Safety Agency (NIMASA) may have started exploratory work on the establishment of yet another academy.
Sources close to the agency confirmed to Shipping Position Daily yesterday that the new location is Escravos in Delta state and that a top delegation from the agency left Lagos yesterday for Delta state to physically inspect and probably take possession of the new site.
Details of the expedition were still sketchy as at press time, but our correspondent learnt that the moved may have surreptitiously killed the Badagry campus which was announced in 2007.
The academy’s premises in Badagry is already overgrown with weeds and is being inhabited by animals.
Shipping Position Daily recalls that prior to yesterday; government had in 2011 constituted a Ministerial Committee on the Establishment of Maritime Academy.
The committee which was headed by NIMASA executive director, administration and finance, Mr Adeniran Aderogba recommended that three more academies should e established to complement Maritime Academy of Nigeria in Oron, Akwa Ibom state.
Our correspondent confirmed that not only did the committee recommend the establishment of three more academies, it also recommended short, medium, and long term measures that the Federal Government must embark upon to address the dearth of adequate manpower in the maritime sector.
While a source told our correspondent that the Escravos mission was to take possession of the land on which the academy would be built, another source said that it was just to see the land and access its suitability.
There has been pressure in many quarters on government to establish more maritime academies, mainly because the Oron Academy has not been able to meet the demand for manpower development in the country. It capacity has been overstretched as the students population continues to increase.
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