CHALLENGES IN THE NIGERIAN MARITIME SECTOR

In the maritime world, a country is measured by the percentage of the world’s total tonnage carried by vessels flying the flag of that country Ii.e. vessels owned by that country. People speak with nostalgia about the late 1970s and early 1980s when Nigeria had about 24 vessels in its national fleet. The fact as revealed by the Nigerian Shipping Companies Association (NSCA) is that even in those days of the now defunct NNSL, indigenous shipping companies carried a mere 11 per cent of the total volume of Nigerian traffic and earned less than 9 percent of the total freight revenue.

Since 1954 when the NPAAct was enacted up to 2006 when the historic merger of NMA and JOMALIC led to the emergence of NIMASA and later to the Cabotage Act of 2003 (and the landmark amendments in 2006),
Nigeria still does not carry any of its crude oil under international shipping. Notwithstanding this drawback, there have been several maritime-related giant strides in terms of the IMO, ILO Conventions, the Abuja MOU and other strategic alliances like membership of Associations of African Maritime Administration (AAMA) that have greatly improved Nigeria’s presence and collaboration among the maritime players in the African subregion……….