Mr. John Patrick Egesi, a maritime economist and consultant, is a former Director General of the National Maritime Authority (NMA) now known as NIMASA, he is also the President of the Nigerian Institute of Shipping (NIS). Shipping Position Daily correspondent DAPO OLAWUNI tracked him down last week and he bared his mind on recent developments in the Nigerian maritime sector.
As the new NIS President, what are the steps you intend to take to reposition the Institute?
Mr. John Patrick Egesi, a maritime economist and consultant, is a former Director General of the National Maritime Authority (NMA) now known as NIMASA, he is also the President of the Nigerian Institute of Shipping (NIS). Shipping Position Daily correspondent DAPO OLAWUNI tracked him down last week and he bared his mind on recent developments in the Nigerian maritime sector.
As the new NIS President, what are the steps you intend to take to reposition the Institute?
The primary purpose of the Nigerian Institute of Shipping is basically to promote shipping in this country, and whatever we do is directed towards that end, and as the president, together with the executives, I am not the only person, nobody can do anything alone, I believe the other people’s focus is also like mine, which is to help in promoting shipping. When you mention the word ‘shipping’, it connotes all sorts of things, for the Shippers Council, it is about promoting the carriage of goods, but when we in the NIS talk about shipping, we are talking about the totality and bottom line of what constitutes shipping for the Nigerian people, we look at it from this point of view, anything that falls short of this is not of interest to us, it’s just academics. If you look at it from the old classical idea of establishing the old National Maritime Authority(NMA) it was basically a simple but very important idea of promoting the bottom ability, the carriage ability of a country, if you just promote the bottom ability you are not doing right, so as the NIS, we look at the parameters that will help us achieve this, and the most important one for now is what is lying at the House of Representatives, which is the chattering of the NIS, for it to be given a chattered body that has the authority to direct and guide the government in our own little way, to ensure that things are done properly. The Chattered Institute of Shipping of Nigeria is not a school in itself, it’s like the clearing house of perfection, ensuring that those involved are trained to the highest level so that when you get our certification it is assumed that you are qualified, it is also to prevent certain malpractices that are very common, it will also be of use for organizations in government, it will be a point of reference for them; as at now, each one does what it does without a linkage. It is true that everyone has its own job to do, but they must also do it in the end for the benefit of the country, if they walk in different directions, the country may suffer at the end of it, when we walk at cross purposes we don’t achieve anything, and my own personal view is that there is a lot of cross purpose functioning in the country as at now, everybody is pursuing what they believe favours them more and this is not what the government meant, we must try to ensure that the vision of this country is not sidetracked by anybody.
What is delaying the Chattered Institute of Shipping Bill at the House of Reps?
It went quite far during the last seating of National Assembly before the election of the new one, for some odd reasons it has not progressed since then, I don’t want to blame the House for it because they were quite eager to ensure that these things work, this is not the time to play the blame game but we are determined to make them realise that the Bill is very important because the people that were looking at it before, some of them may not have come back to the House, the changing of guard (as it were), could have affected the smooth movement and you cannot blame it totally on them, the Institute itself is doing all it can together with our partners to ensure that these laws are passed, we are doing all we can and we are pursuing it with vigor.
As a former DG of the NMA, what is your impression of the present administration of NIMASA?
Traditionally, most past Directors General hardly comment on the performance of those sitting there, if you have anything to say to them you call them, they have listening ears. The present DG is a very simple person, whenever I go to him he listens to me, I think he is doing his best as at now, each time we have opportunity to talk to him he has listened and tried to do one or two things, I understand (but I am not so sure) that he has interviewed staff for promotion, he interviewed them to ensure that the best are promoted and that is a wonderful thing, it is a first and I give him full credit for it, I am sure that he has his heart in the right direction, nobody is perfect, I am not perfect, Patrick Akpobolokemi is not perfect, if you do your bit you go away. The organization as we have it today is a little bit different from the then-NMA, NMA was a simpler organization although the NIMASA today is already inside the loins of the NMA, it just that it is opening up as the years go on, even the future NIMASA will still grow more, but it will all be in the loins, we are the ancestors and during our time we played our role. NIMASA is doing a lot of training, it’s bigger now and so it may not move at the pace we were moving, but the important thing is that the administration, the DG and members of the board have a good heart and have a focus.
Do you think we need boards for maritime parastatals?
Yes, we need a board, but there is a ring of rank that I don’t think we need but I will not mention it, but we need a board, because the board protects the staff from the tyranny of the DG, during my time we had a board and we used to appeal to members of our board that if they feel we are being tyrannical they should tell us. Another question is, what type of board; is the board competent, if you run an organization without a board particularly a government organization made up of different people from parts of the country, people will just do things the way they feel, it is also for the help of the director general himself, sometimes he might be stepping out of bound and the board will caution him, it is very helpful. I know some people will say that they are there to spend money and all that, even private organizations have boards.
What do you think of the constitution of the NIMASA board?
I know that during our time we had somebody from the Navy, because the job of NIMASA is also linked to the job of the Navy, they work in tandem; you need somebody from the ministry of finance because of the monetary aspect, you need somebody from the parent parastatal, you need somebody that is well versed in the issue of shipping, by now I would have expected a former director general of NIMASA to be the chairman of that board, if the country really means well without politics, or to be a member of that board, but I have not seen it happen and I think it’s a minus for the country, it almost wants to give the impression that they don’t want anybody from the past, that anybody from the past has nothing to offer, and this is extremely bad, it puts suspicion on the motives of the government itself, not on NIMASA because NIMASA does not appoint its own board. If the government has a focus, it will ask of people to help out, when you ask questions you get answers, if you go to NNPC board we see former NNPC people because they are advisory, but in NIMASA the past is closed, I don’t know who to blame for this but I don’t think it’s the best.
Do you support calls that NIMASA should hands-off security on the waters for the Navy?
When you say maritime security it depends on the aspect you are talking about, the military security is different from civil security, for instance the security regarding the dumping of waste on our waters is still NIMASA’s function, but the security of pirates is definitely not NIMASA because they are not trained for it, there are things that NIMASA cannot do even if it wants to do them, Customs is also involved, especially in the smuggling of cargo and so on. Like I said earlier, Nigeria is one organization, if our intentions are clean then the question you are asking will not even arise, because the NIMASA will identify the jobs they can do and the ones they cannot do, in those days, the army hands over people to the police and in some cases the police hand over people to the Navy. The issue of whether they should hands off security is difficult to answer because security is of different nature, the ones that belongs to NIMASA belongs to them, the Navy cannot do it even if you want to give it to them. The issue is; what is the intention of those that sent these agencies to work, if the intentions are clean it will be very easy because they were trained for different things.
We also saw that the Nigerian police recently created a marine command
The Nigerian police have always had a marine command; I am surprised that they are now saying that they created one. Like I said, the objective of setting up these agencies is very important, if the navy arrest people it might hand them over to the marine police, it depends on what the statutes say about each one of them, but there are certain things that the police cannot do, the police cannot arrest a ship when it is failing on international laws and port state matters, even if it sees a port state crime it cannot recognize it, so there is no overlapping, it is the knowledge of what is being looked for that matters, if thieves run by the sea why shouldn’t police arrest them, they arrest people on the streets why shouldn’t they arrest people on the sea if they steal things, the Immigration can also be there if they want, in the sense that people might want to migrate wrongly into the country through the sea, it is the various functions of individuals that matters. One thing is very clear, the various maritime laws are not simple laws, the navy cannot recognize it if it sees it, only the maritime people can recognize the infringement of maritime laws because they are trained, once everybody knows what their job is, they can be anywhere they like. NIMASA can even hand over people to the police to detain them, but the police mustn’t cross over to piracy or things that don’t really concern them.
Are you satisfied with the level of growth at the MAN Oron?
I know that MAN Oron was established to bring out the best in our sailors, but whatever happened to MAN Oron is not totally the fault of that school, Nigeria has not recovered from the disbandment of NNSL, but it’s like we don’t seem to want to recall our failures, we don’t want to re-examine things we have done in the past, we just like to keep going until we enter a pit, we are a developing country, the only shipping company we have had was the Nigerian National Shipping Line (NNSL) it is true that there is a lot of demeanor and people not doing it right, but all in all, most of our master mariners were trained there, it is our own and it is where we want it to go that it will go. At that point in time when NNSL was scrapped, it was scrapped under the pretense that it was not making profit, but the shipping line could have changed direction, we could have offered its shares to the public, because the number of ships they had matters, even then, the NNSL was shot in the foot even at its inception by the type of vessel that were bought, I recall the former president Obasanjo saying that he bought certain number of ships, but what he did not tell Nigerians was the type of ships he bought. I am not blaming him, he bought the ships that were presented to him, after all he is only the president and not a shipping expert, by the time they filed the issue of buying ships and the time it was bought was almost a life time, the ships that made it were not proper at the time they were instituted, so from inception the NNSL was caged-in with its vessels that cannot compete in a new world. Things were changing very fast, and this will happen again if we do not change our perception, you may buy a billion dollar ship and still fails, if you don’t buy a ship that fits into the current trend of shipping in the world, the government should make use of the research department of NIMASA to ensure an advisory council for the procurement of vessel, for the approval of vessel and the type of business they are going into. NNSL was a big mistake in many ways, it came up with a lot of corruption, corruption is not just about money, when you put the wrong person in the right position it will be corrupted because he is not equipped as to what he should do, this was the beginning of the corruption at NNSL apart from the wrong purchase of ships. The other things that could have been done with NNSL is that these ships should have been linked with other shipping companies, even Maersk line, what we want at the end is that money should come into government coffers and let Nigerians be trained.
What will you suggest as the way out now?
I am not proposing anything, if government wants to know it, let them consult me, let them directly consult on this matter, we have been giving out things and they don’t appreciate it, they give the impression that we don’t matter, so let them do it themselves.
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