Nigeria’s foremost training institution, Nigerian Institute of Shipping (NIS) has been charged to ensure that it lived up to stakeholders expectation in regards to maritime training in Africa, even as the institute has been described as the face of Nigerian shipping.
Nigeria’s foremost training institution, Nigerian Institute of Shipping (NIS) has been charged to ensure that it lived up to stakeholders expectation in regards to maritime training in Africa, even as the institute has been described as the face of Nigerian shipping.
The President of the African Shipowners’ Association (ASA) and former Director General of the Indigenous Shipowners Association of Nigeria (ISAN) Ms. Funmi Folorunsho gave the charge in Lagos last week at the 6th Annual General Meeting, Induction and Award Night of the Nigerian Institute of Shippijng (NIS) where she charged the institution to work with other training institutions in Nigeria to create the required manpower to drive Nigerian shipping sector.
Folorunsho who was addressing the newly- elected executive council of the NIS headed by the former Director General of the National Maritime Authority (NMA) now known as the Nigerian Maritime Administration and Safety Agency (NIMASA) Mr. Patrick Egesi, said that there are two vacuums that the NIS needs to fill urgently.
Folorunsho told the NIS president that there is work to be done because Nigeria has failed to live up to expectations in African shipping. She pointed out that, at the first inaugural meeting of all heads of maritime administration in Africa which held recently, the Director General of NIMASA was not present.
She also said that her group which is under the African Union also constituted an African Ship Registrars Forum and that NIMASA was not equally there.
Addressing the NIS president, she said; “you are the bridge between NIMASA and the private sector under the platform of the Nigerian Institute of Shipping; we are extending an invitation to you publicly”.
Folorunsho also pointed out that even though Nigerian practitioners are crying to the Federal Government for acquisition of vessels, it is a pity that the country lacks the manpower to manage the vessels
“There is a vacuum, there is no human resource to manage these vessels, we need to get our people trained, if the Federal Government should give us a vessel today there is nobody to man it, therefore there is need for us to work with training institutions”, she stressed.
She however pledged the support of the African Ship-owners Association to the new council of the NIS in achieving the task ahead.
Folorunsho also revealed that her body under the AU is already working towards the creation of an African Cabotage Law which will protect all African countries and help them maximize their available shipping resources,
“We are driving towards an African Cabotage so that if you get away from Nigeria, you can’t get away from Benin, in fact you can’t even get into Africa at all without it, African Cabotage is in the pipeline” she revealed.
She consequently called on the government of African nations to support the signing of the African Maritime Transport Charter which, she said, will create an enabling environment for African vessels will carry goods within the continental coast.
‘’If we come together to sign this charter, Africans will be liberated ,our Nigeria National Shipping Line failed, Kenya national shipping failed, so it is obvious that we cannot do it alone and we all have to come together’’.
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