Nigerian Maritime Administration and Safety Agency (NIMASA) says Nigeria failed to be elected into the category C of the International Maritime Organization (IMO) due to the delay in approval by the Federal Government for the nation to contest for available positions as well as delay in the release of budgetary allocation to the agency.
The Director-General of NIMASA, Dr. Dakuku Peterside who stated this during the just concluded meeting of the ‘G7 Friends of Gulf and Guinea Group’ in Lagos, said while NIMASA spent less than N100 million for the IMO campaign and took only three delegates to the conference, other countries like China, Singapore and United Arab Emirates attended the IMO meeting with a large retinue of delegates and spent huge funds campaigning for the available positions.
He further claimed that the delay in the release of funds to the Agency also hindered early preparations.
“Late preparations and the fact that we did not go round other countries like others did. It would have cost plenty of money, but we are not willing to spend such money. We had considered economic factors in context of our political aspirations.
It is Nigeria that ran for IMO Category C and for you to use the name Nigeria, you must get the approval of the man who is managing all the country, the President just got elected, so it would have gone through a process, we have lost some time, after we got the approval, there are also budgetary processes to go through, even if the approval was given two years ago, we also need to do the background work to get budgetary provision for it before we begin the campaign, all these things affected our early preparations.
But now that we know better, we are starting the next preparations immediately, because we deserve a place in the council of the IMO, these are what we meant by the late preparations”
Meanwhile, ship owners under the aegis of Ship Owners Association of Nigeria (SOAN) have attributed the defeat to government’s neglect of security, infrastructure, seafarers training and fleet development in the country’s maritime domain. According to the the President of SOAN, Greg Ogbeifun
“Our performance at that election has dealt a hard blow on our psyche as a maritime nation. The world has told us that our maritime domain is sick and almost moribund, that we are not a maritime nation that can be relied on for maritime trade, maritime security, infrastructure or for seafarers and other maritime professionals.
We have ignorantly believed that to win election into the IMO Council is by political lobbying, flaunting our economic influence by reason of our vast natural resources which we have failed to appropriately harness to impact the lives and fortunes of our vast population.”
The IMO according to Vanguard is a specialized agency of the United Nations, responsible for the global standard-setting authority for the safety, security and environmental performance of international shipping. The IMO Council is the highest governing body of the organization and it comprises three categories namely Category A, B and C.
"Category A comprises 10 countries with the largest interest in providing international shipping services; Category B comprises with the largest interest in international seaborne trade; while Category C comprises 20 countries not elected under category A or B, which have special interests in maritime transport or navigation, and whose election to the Council will ensure the representation of all major geographic areas of the world."
