NIMASA Takes Cabotage Campaign to Calabar

As part of its efforts to ensure that the requirements of the Nigerian Cabotage Act are properly implemented, the Nigeria Maritime Administration and safety Agency (NIMASA), Eastern Zone has taken the ‘implementation fight’ to Calabar, Cross Rivers State.
Shipping Position weekly correspondent in Port Harcourt gathered that the campaign for the Eastern zone which commenced last week is part of the efforts to ensure appropriate placement for Seafarers in that part of the country.

As part of its efforts to ensure that the requirements of the Nigerian Cabotage Act are properly implemented, the Nigeria Maritime Administration and safety Agency (NIMASA), Eastern Zone has taken the ‘implementation fight’ to Calabar, Cross Rivers State.
Shipping Position weekly correspondent in Port Harcourt gathered that the campaign for the Eastern zone which commenced last week is part of the efforts to ensure appropriate placement for Seafarers in that part of the country.
According to a close source at the office of the zonal coordinator, the parley at Calabar took place among the zonal management team of NIMASA, and that they met in order to deliberate on how to map out strategies for effective and efficient operations in the zone.
It was gathered that the Calabar meeting which is a road map, will henceforth be held quarterly with the aim to address peculiar challenges of operations in each of the eastern state and to also address all the gray areas in the functions of NIMASA.
 “Cabotage implementation is already taking its hold. There is a drive for increment of seafaring activities, and enhanced placement of seafarers in compliance of Cabotage law,” a staff of the zone who pleaded anonymity told our correspondent last week.
Our source also quoted the new Zonal Coordinator as saying at the meeting that NIMASA business as a watchdog will no longer be business as usual for those that abuse it and that the zone is doing everything possible to weed- off foreign seafarers who have taken over Nigerian jobs.
The Calabar parley was received with joy from stakeholders drawn from all the states in the zone and they therefore advised the new Coordinator to ensure that the quarterly Zonal meeting is sustained.
Contacted for comments, the assistant to the Eastern zone Coordinator of NIMASA, Dr Ifeanyi Obulor expressed satisfaction with the new job drive by the coordinator. He described him as a square peg in a square hole.