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By Kenneth Jukpor
Amid plans by some shipping companies to introduce several new charges in Nigeria, a former Director of Commercial Shipping Services at the Nigerian Shippers’ Council (NSC) Mrs. Dabney Shall-Holma has endorsed these additional charges by shipping companies and terminal operators in the country.
Shall-Holma stressed that some of the impending charges by shipping companies such as congestion charges were as a result of the unhealthy business environment which the companies have been subjected to, noting that such factors mitigate against the profitability of their investments.
Shall-Holma, who was speaking to journalists during the annual business luncheon of Women’s International Shipping and Trading Association (WISTA) Nigeria, added that; “the problem with Nigerian ports is not just the access roads but also the draft. The Port of Lome has been dredged to 17-18meters so it could receive an 8,000 container carrier which a Nigerian port is not able to receive.”
She stressed that this factor, to a large extent has limited bulk cargo vessels from coming to Nigeria.
Shall-Holma also decried the poor state of the port access roads, even as she admonished the Federal Government to utilize the inland waterways to solve the problem of evacuating goods from the ports.
“There is one major artillery in the movement of goods that Nigeria has neglected for years and that is the inland waterways. We can transfer cargo by barges. So many people transfer cargo via barges. The benefits are enormous because a truck can only carry 25,000 metric tonnes but a barge could carry what 1,050 trucks would carry. This would enable us remove about 216 rail carriers from the rail tracks and also rid the roads of trucks and tankers”
Although, she commended Grimaldi Shipping Company for introducing the use of barges in its operations, she urged other shipping companies to embrace the use of barges.
Meanwhile, in her opening remarks, the President of WISTA Nigeria, Mrs. Mary Hamman stated that the event was more than a business luncheon as it included a lecture by the Minister of Power, Works and Housing, Mr. Babatunde Fashola.
She stated that the Minister’s paper was geared towards discussing the headway for development and maintenance of port access roads across the country, with the theme: “Road Infrastructure Development and Maintenance of Ports Artery Roads as Panacea for National Development”
Mary Hamman explained that the WISTA existed worldwide primarily to appraise and address the needs of women in shipping and trading; as well as providing an avenue for mentoring and capacity building.
During the presentation, the Minister for Works, Power and Housing, Mr. Fashola represented by his Special Assistant on Technical, Dr. Kabiru Hamzat stated that the Federal Government could no longer fund the construction of roads across the country.
Kabiru revealed that the Ministry of Works has a debt load of N1.6trillion since 2015, while its 2015 and 2016 budget for Works were N206billion and N251billion respectively.
As a result of these fiscal challenges, Mr. Kabiru stated “We can’t fix Nigerian roads with government money. We can only find a way through Public-Private Partnerships. We must be informative because government can’t fund the roads by itself”
Kabiru also revealed that the Ministry was trying to balance the geo-political spread of its projects as certain Senators representing other areas have frowned at the over-concentration on Lagos and South-West for development of roads.
“Other Senators representing the North or South, for instance don’t care about the roads leading to Lagos ports and the Lagos-Ibadan expressway eventhough these roads are critical to the nation’s progress. People are in the Senate to project the interest of their states and constituencies, that is why we presented a budget of N31.5billion for the Lagos-Ibadan expressway but the Senate slashed it by N10billion which makes it difficult to carry out the project especially as the contractor is aware that you can’t pay him completely” he told MMS Plus newspaper.
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