General Manager of BUA Ports and Terminal Limited, Port Harcourt, Mohammed Lile Ibrahim, says BUA group of companies is at home in Rivers State.
Speaking during a courtesy visit by Energy and Maritime Reporters (EMR) in Port Harcourt, Ibrahim described the business environment in Rivers State as “very conducive”.
Citing good road infrastructure, especially within the period of the last administration in the state and the present administration, he, however, noted that there are challenges of inappropriate demands from communities and unauthorised government agencies.
“These are normal things”, he said, “but since we have come to sit here permanently, we have also built up a team that’s able to manage all these challenges either from communities or from government agencies coming to ask for one thing or the other, or from even people who pretend to be from government”.
The General Manager advised those in the habit of cooking up demands to desist from creating tension where it is not necessary, but rather appreciate what businesses such as BUA have come to do in the State.
BUA group, he explained, “is on ground in the State and stands up appropriately to different task forces enforcing different demands”.
According to him, illegitimate harassment is sometimes encountered and is more common in the Niger Delta region than elsewhere in the country.
He cited the case of titled chiefs confronting the company to complain about ships destroying their communities’ fishing nets.
He said, “Here, there are basic things to understand. Water channels are common user channels and government has right of way over such channels. You don’t set fishing nets along common user channels where vessels on international voyages will pass”.