Cabotage Act: Ship Owners Task FG On Waivers Clause

The chairman of the Nigerian
Ship Owners Association (NISA), Chief Isaac Jolapamo, has called on the Federal Government to remove the waivers clause in the  Cabotage Act to enable them in business.
According to the NISA boss who spoke in Lagos recently inclusion of the waivers clause in the act has added to their problems as if has put them at a disadvantaged position in the sector.
He said indigenous shipping firms are owing banks a staggering $3 billion even as he said the removal of the waiver clause would help improve the business of indigenous ship owners.
Jolapamo said that about 50 per cent of indigenous ship owners have been thrown out of business due to the poor implementation of the Cabotage law.
He explained that at a recent stakeholders meeting with  the Minister of Transport,Senator Idris Umar,  on policy guidelines, for the granting of ministerial waivers under the cabotage law, NISA had made the same appeal.
“The removal will help to address the plight of indigenous ship owners whose businesses have been damaged”, he said.
He added that it was sad that indigenous ship owners were not doing well inspite of the fact that they started maritime business in the country.
Speaking in the same vein, the secretary of NISA, Capt Niyi Labinjo explained that the waiver clause has been made more important by the government to the detriment of implementation of the cabotage law itself.
He expressed alarm at the kind of vessels granted waivers in the country, instead of giving waivers to sprecialised vessels in consonance with the dreams of the initiators of the Act.
He said the development has created a situation where waivers were given to anchor handling and tankers which the Act did not envisage for waiver.
He explained that in other climes the administration of waivers was not left in the hands of busy government officials.
According to him, rather, an all-inclusive exercise where applications were received by the agency concerned and forwarded to the stakeholders who do the needful and make recommendations to the implementing agency that carry out the recommendation is the practice.