The Senate, yesterday, witnessed a mild drama on the floor during the consideration of the report of its Joint Committees on Navy, Marine Transport, and Finance, on the alleged illegal security activities of Ocean Marine Solutions Limited (OMLS) at the Secure Anchorage Area (SAA) of Lagos Ports.

The chairman of the probe panel, Senator George Sekibo (PDP, Rivers East) had presented the report to the apex legislative chamber for consideration.

However, shortly after the presentation, a member of the joint committee, Senator Ahmad Baba-Kaita (APC, Katsina North), rose and strongly opposed some of the recommendations of the committee, describing the report as lopsided.

Baba-Kaita raised a protest against the report when he was asked by the President of the Senate, Dr. Ahmad Lawan, who recognised him, to make contribution to the report.

The lawmaker, who is a member of the committee, immediately started attacking the recommendations, pushing Lawan to query his position on the document in spite of signing it alongside other members.

Lawan said: “This is your signature that I am seeing here. Is this signature not yours; are you not the one that signed this?”
However, Baba-Kaita claimed that he didn’t sign and was not comfortable with the report.

“This report is too lopsided and does not represent the true side. I am not comfortable with the report. This report will not help the security of this country, it’s lopsided,” he said.

Another member of the committee and former Gombe State governor, Senator Danjuma Goje (APC Gombe Central), countered Baba-Kaita, pointing out that what the report was saying was that OMLS should continue to provide security in the nation’s waterways until government was ready to provide alternative.

He said: “It is dangerous for us to open our borders. The security of our waters is still in the hands of the Navy, it is not true that it is in the hands of strangers.”

Also, the Senate Minority Leader, Enyinnaya Abaribe (PDP Abia South), said that it was uncharitable to accuse the committee that investigated the activities of OMSL of bias.

“It is unfortunate that our Navy cannot protect our waterways. How can an individual have a platform and the Navy doesn’t?

“Somebody has been given a job that ought to have been done by Navy and the Navy doesn’t have the platform to do it. Why will the Nigerian agency want to leave our border porous? We must, at all times, put Nigeria first and the ease of doing business must be of interest to us,” Abaribe said.

Contributing, Senator Solomon Adeola (APC, Lagos West) disclosed that the committee invited all agencies that had one thing or another to do with the issue and they came out to give testimonies and the Navy admitted that they were in charge and that OMSL only provided the vessels.

He noted that the Nigeria Port Authority (NPA) didn’t complain that what the company was doing was wrong, but only complained that the money charged per vessel was high.

The lawmaker stated that NPA could only afford four vessels and only one was working, which was not enough to provide security on the waterways, stressing that Navy was short of 150 vessels.

Before putting the resolutions to voice vote, the President of the Senate frowned that the matter was being discussed in the open, exposing the inadequacies of government.

“It is unfortunate we are discussing this in the open, we have been described as the giant of Africa and yet we don’t have the resources,” he said.

Lawan suggested that, rather than make the matter contentious, the question that should be asked was, “how many years are we going to continue with the company and when is government taking over?” adding that “we should look for a way to have our own.”

The Senate, however, resolved that the Nigerian Navy, the NPA and Nigerian Maritime Administration & Safety Agency (NIMASA) should be commended for initiating and implementing a process that led to the provision of enhanced and advanced maritime security in the SAA in the Lagos waters in 2013, which led to checkmating the high rate of attacks on vessels waiting to berth at the Lagos Ports.

The chamber also said that since no fraud was found in the operations of the OMSL and was operating at no cost to government, the firm should be allowed to continue its operation at the SAA until such a time when a better and more cost effective system would be put in place by the government.

The Senate further urged that the Nigerian Navy should be properly funded to enable it procure needed vessels to clear the over 150 vessels deficit to enable them carry out their constitutional responsibilities without over-depending on Private Maritime Logistics Support Companies (PMLSC).

Presenting the report earlier, Senator Sekibo said that the Nigerian Ports Act, 1954 had given the NPA the responsibility of charting, designating, owning, operating and managing anchorage areas, but was silent on the provision or establishment of the SAA.

He also stated that both the NPA and NIMASA were of the views that issues related to anchorage and anchorage areas were the responsibility of NPA.

The lawmaker pointed out that the Nigerian Navy was responsible for securing the Nigerian territorial waterways and was at liberty to be in a collaboration that would effectively enhance its operations and assist in delivering its mandate.

he lawmaker, who is a member of the committee, immediately started attacking the recommendations, pushing Lawan to query his position on the document in spite of signing it alongside other members.

Lawan said: “This is your signature that I am seeing here. Is this signature not yours; are you not the one that signed this?”
However, Baba-Kaita claimed that he didn’t sign and was not comfortable with the report.

GOFRONT:
This is Nigeria.....Everybody corruptly fighting for his pocket......

sissyevy:
na wa for this our leaders

Mutemenot:
Selfishness depriving them from saying the truth and acting wisely.