FMOT Set to Implement a National Maritime Policy |The Source

By Sandra Ukele

The Federal Ministry of Transportation (FMOT) is committed to providing the necessary framework to implement a maritime transport policy.

This, it assured, would be done through the approval of the Federal Executive Council.

The Minister of State for Transportation, Gbemisola Saraki, revealed this at a stakeholders validation forum to draft a national maritime transport policy.

Saraki admitted that the absence of a maritime national policy is responsible for the poor performance of the industry.

The Minister of State represented by the Permanent Secretary, FMOT, Magdalene Ajani, explained that whereas boundless economic opportunities in the industry exist, poor regulation and underutilized resources call for a workable maritime transport policy.

Saraki Asserts:

“In the maritime industry in Nigeria we do not have a national policy document on which our activities are regulated so we need to have this document that we can use to operationalize our activities and regulate the activities in the maritime industry is something that is quite important to us.

” It is instructive to note that the performance of the sector is further constrained by the challenges posed by insecurity, inadequate infrastructure, bureaucracy, weak laws, corrupt practices, inadequate capital for investment and maintenance of ships, poor incentives for investors, lack of indigenous carrier vessels, sea unworthiness of indigenous vessels where they are available, poor integrated water transport systems; among others.

” While aknowledging the existence of a number of strategies and associate policies relevant to the governance of the nation’s maritime environment, there is no all-encompassing policy at the national level to holistically address the afore-mentioned challenges in the maritime sector.

“This informed the need for this current administration and the leadership of the Federal Ministry of Transportation to embark on developing an all encompassing and all-inclusive national maritime transport policy that will stand the test of time and foster a robust maritime industry that will guarantee sustainable socio-economic development of the country.”

Saraki continued that:

“This has been under work for seven years but now it has become a huge priority for both the Ministry and government of President Muhammad Buhari.

“We hope that with the buy-in of stakeholders in the Western Zone and with a similar stakeholders meeting in the Eastern Zone by the end of February, we should be coming up with a clean document between the end of first quarter of 2021,” she explains.