Even as fresh interests are being indicated in which organisation should become the regulator in the post-concession port and transport sector system, a fresh move by the Nigerian Shippers’ Council to re-merge as the preferred agency to transmute to the National Transport Commission (NTC) has suffered yet another failure.
The failure is one of the conspicuous recommendations of the ministerial committee on the proposed NTC which submitted its report to the minister of transport, Alhaji Yusuf Suleiman last week in Abuja.
The committee which is headed by Dr Gbolahan Elias also drew representatives from a cross- section of transport sector stakeholders.
Our correspondent confirmed last week that even though its terms of reference was such that it was expected to turn-in the name of Nigerian Shippers’ Council as the appropriate agency that should transmute to the NTC, the committee bluntly knocked off that intendment.
“Even though the committee acknowledged that there was a vacuum in the performance of regulatory functions in the nation’s port system, it fell short of recommending that any existing agency should perform that role2, a source who pleaded anonymity told our correspondent on Friday.
It was however agreed that whichever way the pendulum swings, the aviation sector should not be lumped together with maritime and raid transportation modes when the issue of regulation is finally decided.
Shipping Position Weekly recalls that Shippers’ Council almost got the nod of former transport minister, Mrs Deizani Allison Madueke to transmute to NTC, but the emergence of the demand by maritime sector stakeholders for an Independent Port Regulatory Commission and their insistence that no existing agency should be allowed to take up that responsibility effectively killed the ambition.
The position of stakeholders informed the consensus for the independent regulatory agency which is already an integral part of the Ports and Harbour Bill which is currently awaiting passage at the National Assembly.
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