₦airaland Forum

AUGUST 15, 2018

By Godfrey Bivbere

The plight of ports at the Nigeria’s eastern and delta coastlines may have been compounded by sea robbery and militancy even as some technical challenges linger.

Vanguard Maritime Report investigations reveal that the spate of attacks has not been contained even after ceasefire with militants about three years ago.

Consequently, international shipping firms have placed high-risk rating in the freight charges, a situation which has made cost of shipments to the ports uncompetitive.

For example while it costs shipment from China to Lagos would cost about $1,500 same consignments going to Calabar costs between $4,000 to $4,500.

In addition to the cost challenges investigations by Vanguard Maritime Report also indicated some technical short-comings in the ports such as shallow berths and draft deficiency of the channels.

The ports currently have berth depth of between 6 – 11 meters compared to the Lagos port with berth depth ranging from 9 – 13.5 meters. Standard port berths in other West African countries like Accra, Ghana is 19 metres, Lome, Togo is 16 metres, Cameroon at 16 metres and Cotonou, Benin Republic at 15 metres.

With this technical deficiency the ports at the eastern and delta coastlines would not be able to take size of container-bearing vessels that normally call at standard ports, except for specialised vessels constructed as flat bottom which many international shipping firms have not been willing to use.

The other technical deficiency with the ports, Vanguard Maritime Report investigations show, is that the draught of the channels are below standard.

For the channel leading to the ports, Lagos port has a draught of 13.5 meters, that of Port Harcourt is between 7.1 – 9.1 meters, that of Warri stands at between 6.4 – 7.6 meters, Onne has between 8 – 11 meters and Calabar has 6.4 meters during high tide and 5.4 meters during low tide.

Meanwhile, stakeholders in the maritime industry have attributed the situation of the ports to government neglect despite the huge potential for development of the areas and the Nigerian economy.

They also believe the full functioning of the ports in the Eastern and Delta areas would decongest the Lagos ports while increasing the nation’s maritime industry capacity in terms of volume of cargo through-put and clearing turn-around time.

The stakeholders disclosed that besides the technical deficiencies and the criminal attacks which had dented the risk ratings of the ports, the space sizes of the berths of the ports in the eastern and delta area, cargo handling equipment as well as the quays of the ports are adequate to operate effectively and efficiently.

Apart from the above seeming disadvantage, the quays, operational space, the cargo handling equipment are available to give port speedy and cheaper port services compared to those in Lagos, operators say.

The industry operators believe the government could have intervened in those identified deficiencies and bring the ports to good use. Michael Ogodo, Chairman Shippers Association of Cross Rivers State, SACRS, told Vanguard Maritime Report that the Calabar port as it is has the capacity to receive ocean going vessels and should be exploited by federal government through provision of incentives to stakeholders.

According to Ogodo, “Yes, the port has what it takes to receive bigger vessels if the channel is dredged. The SACRS chairman said though there seem to be a surge in shipping activities in Calabar port, it is driven by petroleum import which is not beneficial to the economy of the people.

According to Ogodo, only commercial imports can benefit the people and that has stopped some years back. He said export goods from the state have to be taken to Lagos before they are shipped out of the country.

The SACRS boss said 1999 and 2007 when Donald Duke was governor of the state, and the TINAPA and LAFARGE Africa PLC projects were on-going, a MaerskLine ship was calling at the port every fourth night and that they (shippers) took advantage of that to do direct export from there.

Six months before the completion of the projects during the regime governor Liyel Imoke, Ogodo said they had gone to the governor to intervene as Mearsk Line had said it could no longer come to Calabar at the completion of the project.

He stressed that the efforts of the governor did not yield any positive result as the federal government did not respond positively to pleas by the state governor. He noted that apart from the shallow nature of the ports’ channels, the berths’ depths are okay to receive most vessels. The other issue, he explained, is the constant pirates’ attacks on ships calling at the port.

He listed the obstacles to development and utilization of the Eastern and Delta ports including the absence of import and export cargoes, the difficult navigational area and the frequent attacks on vessels forced up the cost of freight by over 150 percent.

Consequently, according to him, while a consignment from China to Lagos would cost about $1,500 same consignments going to Calabar costs between $4,000 to $4,500.

He explained that the same reason is responsible for the hike in the insurance on both the ship and the cargo He recommended that government should acquire small vessels that do rounds from Lagos to Calabar, Port Harcourt and Warri, taking consignments from Lagos to these ports as well as bringing export cargoes back to Lagos as an immediate quick win measure, while provision of security, dredging of the channel and giving concession to shipping lines should be the long term sustainable measure.


Industry Chiefs Speak

Similarly, National President of the Association of Nigeria Licensed Customs Agents, ANLCA, Tony Iju Nwabunike, agreed with Ogodo on the issues of dredging of the channels and concession to shipping lines. He listed the non-functional ports including Warri, Calabar, Port Harcourt, Koko and even the new port in Delta State.

Nwabunike noted that the federal government has not yet taken a decision with the concessionaires and shipping companies whom they have actually given the nod to bring in consignments to those areas.

He further explained: “Another problem about these ports is the freights; the freight has been the problem of these ports because those freights are higher than the freight at the Lagos ports.

“People are actually looking forward to getting things cheaper when they import. Most importantly, the consumers are more in Lagos but if there is competitive rate on the freight differentials, or putting them in very low level freight differentials, I think they can use these ports.

“So, I’m actually asking the federal government to make those ports user-friendly, if they make those ports very user-friendly, we can actually import through those ports.

“It is important to decentralize like I always say, it is very important to decentralize so that people will use it.

“If you are importing from China, some are saying $2,500, & 3,500 for 20 feet container and $4000 to $5000 for the 40 feet container. If they can actually sail in the same rate or bring it a little bit down, people will now say, okay because of one thousand dollars they can go to eastern ports and do the business,” he concluded.

Speaking on the issue, Managing Director of PTOL, Lizzy Ovbude, blamed the neglect on government policies as well as the concessioning exercise. She said: “I know that when NPA was still the master sea dock, to improve traffic in the Eastern flank, NPA had to give about 30 percent discount. That was some years back, before the concessioning.

“They gave about 30 percent discount to vessels that are willing to come to the Eastern ports. That was a kind of encouragement to enable vessels to come to this part of the country. But after the concessioning, there has been no such encouragement.

“For Port Harcourt port, I don’t know whether it is a kind of conspiracy from ship owners; you know that the shipping industry is dominated by foreigners.

“They own the vessels. I do know that we have done a lot of marketing campaigns from Port Harcourt ports here. We have been to clients at Enugu, Aba, Onitsha, Nnewi, which is the Eastern flank, who import through Lagos and made them know that we are actually back. They have shown a lot of interest but one issue we have always had is the vessels to bring such cargo, that is, containerized vessels.

“Before now, we had reached an agreement with two shipping lines who agreed to come and as we were doing the marketing campaign, they suddenly withdrew their vessels.

“And you know, when you have been to a client once, twice and they are showing interest and suddenly everything goes down, they will not take you seriously anymore.

“That is what the shipping companies have made us look like. And up until now, we still have clients that have been calling, making enquires on vessels that could come.

“They are all foreign ship owners and if they say they are not coming, we cannot force them to come. And that is why you see the importers go to Lagos and begin to truck their cargo down.

”Efforts to get the reaction of the NPA proved abortive as neither of the Assistant General Managers in the Corporate and Strategic Communications of the Authority, Isah Sewuad and Ibrahim Nasiru, picked their calls. Former Managing Director of the NPA, Habib Abdullahi, had said that the low level of the river which makes the siltation (rate of return of sand to the channel after dredging) level very high is the cause of the delay in the dredging of the channel.

Abdullahi, who spoke through the then General Manager in charge of Public Affairs, Emmanuel Ebubuegu, said “The study of geography tells us that at the lower course of the river, the level of sedimentation is very high. Incidentally, the ports of Warri, Calaber and Port Harcourt are all situated at the lower course of river. If you do not do something to address the hindrance properly, you will always be fighting with nature.”

For Warri port, he said in 2015 the Authority had commenced the process leading to the dredging of the channel by engaging the services of two firms to do the preliminary work. He said the two firms are Royal Ascony, which is looking at the break waters, and Ace Consulting that is working on the pre-dredging. Three years after nothing has been done, only confirming the fears in some quarters that the neglect of the Eastern and Delta ports is deliberate.

By: Collins Nweze On: August 15, 2018

•Southwest leads in financial access

NorthEast and Southeast regions have the least access to banking, a report on financial access touch-points released yesterday has shown.

With five per cent financial access touch-points for the Northeast and seven per cent for the Southeast, both regions remain disadvantaged in access to financial services despite efforts by the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), Bankers’ Committee and commercial banks to take banking to the grassroots, the Shared Agent Network Expansion Facility (SANEF) report has shown.

The CBN has voted N20 billion for banks, Nigeria Inter-Bank Settlement Systems (NIBSS), licensed Mobile Money Operators and Shared Agents to accelerate financial inclusion and take banking to more Nigerians.


Southwest is leading on financial access touch-points with 54 per cent; Southsouth 12 per cent; Northcentral 11 per cent and Northwest 10 per cent. It said Nigeria has 5,600 bank branches, 17,600 Automated Teller Machines (ATMs); 15,000 Point of Sale terminals and 51,754 Agents as at December last year.

A member of Technical Committee of SANEF, Bolaji Lawal, said the SANEF initiative involves on-boarding 40 million low income and un-served Nigerians into the financial system, increasing financial access points from the current 50,000 to 500,000 by 2020 and deepening access to mobile and digital financial products and services such as savings accounts, microloans, insurance, pensions by Nigerians.

He explained that the project seeks to deepen financial inclusion through an integrated ecosystem with strong regulatory oversight, consumer protection and interoperable payment systems with limited concentration risk. “It will create a platform for Nigerian owned financial services companies to grow, whilst empowering and creating jobs for Nigerians. So, wherever you see the SANEF sign, you can perform basic financial services such as account opening, cash deposits, cash withdrawals, funds transfers and bills payments,” he said at a media briefing in Lagos .

He said the project is expected to reduce transaction costs, bring about convenience, create job opportunities, and increased adoption of financial services. The platform is also expected to handle government’s social disbursements initiatives. It will also lead to reduced cash dependency, better tax collections and reduction in crime rates.

He said the SANEF will help the banks achieve 70 million Bank Verification Number (BVN) Bank Accounts by 2020 from about 34 million at present.

He explained that Nigeria’s financial inclusion model is similar to Indian model, where over 1.2 billion people gained access to financial services.

He said that BVN roll-out is aggressive with NIBSS already partnering with Agent Managers appointed by banks, Other Financial Institutions, Mobile Money Operators, Super Agents and other licenced Nigerian companies for remote BVN enrollments. NIBSS will ensure training of Agent/Managers to ensure proper hand-holding as may be required for the BVN enrollment process.

“NIBSS is expected to provide the BVN enrollment devices for the agents. Remote capture devices will be made available to agents across Nigeria particularly rural areas with priority for North East, North Central and North West. NIBSS will pay N100 to agents for every unique BVN enrolled and targets 40 million unique BVN by 2020,” he said.

He said BVN enrollment in 774 Local Government Areas across the country will commence in September and that Nigeria had adopted the Indian financial inclusion model where over 1.2 billion people are uniquely identified.

He said the Nigeria target is to achieve 70 million BVN target by 2020 and create more access to financial system especially at the grassroots.

SternProphet:
Amechi was cheated during primaries of PDP. Omehia was imposed as PDP candidate, contested and won as governor, was in office for almost two years before being removed by the court on the basis that he did not win the primaries of PDP legally. The judgement did not give the office to any other party but same PDP but it changed the governor.
This judgement only worked based on the reasoning thst the party OWNS the seat or office. We actually vote party when we go put to vote.
When you switch parties after winning the seat, you are breaking two contracts, one with your party and the other with the electorate.

By Ahmed Tahir Ajobe, Minna

The immediate past Nigeria Ambassador to South Africa, Ahmed Ibeto has disclosed that the recurring incidences of murder involving Nigerians were being carried out by Nigerians themselves contrary to claims of xenophobic attacks.

In an interactive session with journalists shortly after the presentation a letter of intention to vie for the governorship of Niger state on the platform of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) on Monday in Minna, Ibeto said from the statistics of killings and their remote and immediate causes available to the Nigeria Embassy, most of the incidences were as a result of conflict between Nigerians.

“I can authoritatively tell you from the evidences we have that out of four of such killings involving Nigerians, three are by Nigerians themselves as a result of rivalry, shady deals, cultism and drugs,” he said.

He said in most cases, the conflict is as a result of territorial control between drug barons which often results in deaths and destructions, even as he disclosed that barons also kill their aides and workers who betray them in the cause of business.

He explained that he has on many occasions submitted detailed reports on such crises to the federal government, who promptly collaborate with South Africa authority to stem the tide.

He however said there were few exception where South Africans attack and even murder Nigerians.

deomelo:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1RzZiw4GVf8


Here is the video.


Very sad.

Johnnyessence:
let me come and be going nairaland politician. more signing coming. besides do you have pvc to votes niiiii.

Johnnyessence:
but distinguish senator Ademola Adeleke is the senator representing Osun west senatorial district.

seanfer:
The APC picked the Deputy Governorship Candidate from his town of EDE and that means they will share the Votes in his stronghold

Johnnyessence:
but distinguish senator Ademola Adeleke is the senator representing Osun west senatorial district.

By: Adesoji Adeniyi, Osogbo. On: August 7, 2018

https://thenationonlineng.net/wp-content/uploads/2018/04/Ademola-Adeleke.jpg

A fresh suit against the Osun State governorship candidate of the People’s Democratic Party, Senator Ademola Adeleke, has been filed in the state High Court, Osogbo, the state capital.

Two PDP delegates, Olagboye Adedamola and Oyetunji Suredi, who accused Adeleke of forging the testimonial and statement of result he presented to the Independent National Electoral Commission, also dragged before the court the PDP the state Chairman, Hon. Soji Adagunodo, and his state executive council members and the INEC.

At the hearing of the case before the court on Tuesday, the plaintiffs asked for an abridged date for the respondents to appear after the service within seven days instead of 21 days and the court order to allow them to advertise all their applications in the national dailies.

The court after the submission of the plaintiffs’ counsel, Bar. Abdulrahman Okunade granted the two prayers.

In the new suit attached with seven exhibits and a 37-paragraph affidavit, the plaintiffs sought for seven reliefs and asked the court to disqualify Senator Adeleke from contesting the September 22 polls as the governorship candidate of the PDP.

They specifically asked the court to bar Adeleke from the poll “on account of ineligibility, false information and submission of false documents to the INEC as the 4th defendant in the suit.”

They urged the court to declare the first runner-up in the PDP primary conducted on July 21, Dr. Akin Ogunbiyi as the party’s lawful candidate for the forthcoming governorship election.

In his ruling, the presiding judge, Justice David Oladimeji, adjourned the case till tomorrow Wednesday.

Oluwole Ige - Osogbo

22 governorship election in Osun State, the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), has displayed for public scrutiny, a list of 48 candidates of political parties participating in the exercise as well as their running mates and the certificates being paraded by the contestants.

Following the development, however, fresh facts emerged on Friday on how detectives from the Force Criminal Investigation Department (FCID), Ikoyi, Lagos, arrested the principal of Ede Muslim High School I, Ede, Mr Khalid Abass, in a move to investigate the statement of results and testimonial of the governorship candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Senator Adeleke.

The list with photocopies of the candidates’ academic qualifications, which was attached to Form CF001, is displayed on the notice board at the frontage of the state headquarters of the electoral body in Osogbo.

When Saturday Tribune visited the INEC secretariat, located opposite Osun State House of Assembly Complex, politicians and members of the public were seen reading through the list and checking the information contained in Form CF001 submitted by the candidates of the different political parties and their running mates.

A check through the Form CF001 submitted by the candidates indicated that the standard-bearer of the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC), Mr Adegboyega Isiaka Oyetola, holds a Bachelor of Science in Insurance and a Master’s degree in Business Administration, while the candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Senator Ademola Adeleke, filed in his school certificate results and testimonial from Ede Muslim High School 1, Ede.

The standard-bearer of the Social Democratic Party (SDP), Senator Iyiola Omisore, said he holds Doctor of Philosophy (Ph.D.) in Infrastructure Business Management and a Master of Science (M.Sc.) degree in Building Service Engineering, just as the candidate of the Alliance for Democracy (AD), Mr James Olugbenga Akintola, holds a Bachelor of Science (BSc.) degree and M.Sc. in Architecture. The governorship candidate of the Accord Party (AP) holds a BSc. degree in Sociology and Anthropology.

While the standard-bearer of the African Democratic Congress (ADC), Mr Kazeem Ademola Adio, a former Secretary to the Osun State Government (SSG), holds a BSc. in Accounting and a Master’s degree in International Marketing Management, his counterpart in the Action Democratic Party (ADP), Chief Moshood Olalekan Adeoti, also a former Secretary to the Osun State Government (SSG), holds a first degree in Business Administration.

The candidate of the All Progressives Grand Alliance (APGA), Mr Oluwatoki Adetokunbo Adedayo, holds a Higher National Diploma (HND) in Fine Arts, just as the standard-bearer of the All Grassroots Alliance (AGA), Hon. Kehinde Olufemi Lawrence, holds a first degree in Law and the candidate of the Unity Party of Nigeria (UPN), Mr Adediji Olanrewaju Adewuyi, a first degree in Education.

Read more at: http://www.tribuneonlineng.com/158224/