The Nigerian Maritime Administration and Safety Agency (NIMASA) has that over 38% of the one hundred and twenty-nine port facilities in the Country were fully compliant with the International Ships and Port Facility Security (ISPS) Code.
The Director-General of NIMASA, Mr. Ziakede Patrick Akpobolokemi who disclosed this in a speech delivered at a World press Conference held in Lagos on Tuesday, stated that this comprised of all the major ports in the country.
According to him,” this is a great improvement from the less than 7% compliance level before the appointment of NIMASA as the Designated Authority (DA) in 2013. Our goal is to attain over 90% compliance level before the end of 2015 by the continuous Verification Inspection Exercise (VIE) of Port Facilities to maintain implementation pace and focus on continuous improvement”.
He also said that the agency had been able to gradually increase its Ports State Control Performance in the last twelve months due to increase in the agency’s manpower capacity and availability of vessels for its operations.
He said, “I am delighted to inform you that the Secretary General of the Abuja Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) on Port State Control recently commended NIMASA for being the foremost Port State administration in the West and Central African Sub-Region just like other leading maritime stakeholders have commended NIMASA”.
The NIMASA boss announced that the agency had been able to achieve full domain awareness of its maritime environment, a feat that had not been attained before the present management was appointed adding that the agency had utilized both technology and personnel to attain the present level of maritime domain awareness.
On the NIMASA Satellite Surveillance Centre which was launched in June, 2014, Akpobolokemi hinted that the system had been instrumental to the agency winning the war against piracy as according to him, it was strategic in the successful operations to curb maritime breaches with the most recent being the Joint Task Force “Operation Pulo Shield” to interdict and arrest a vessel MT Skye which was involved in illegal lifting of crude oil in the coastal waters off Brass.
He maintained that the partnership entered into with a private company, Messrs Global West Vessels Specialist Limited (GWSVL) had continued to yield dividends for the government and had helped the agency to enforce its mandate.
“Prior to the concession contract, the Agency was practically constrained to enforce regulations and undertake any meaningful field operations as expected of a Maritime Administration. We have successfully reversed the trend as we now patrol our maritime domain with considerable capability to respond to marine emergencies within a reasonable time frame”.
“The NIMASA fleet includes Search and Rescue Vessels, Pollution Control Vessels and Patrol Vessels deployed by NIMASA in conjunction with the Nigerian Navy and other Security agencies under the Maritime Guard Command”.
“The PPP project has also made it possible for the agency to provide suitable platforms to relevant security agencies collaborating with us to fight piracy and other sundry security breaches in our waters. Accordingly, the agency has successfully carried out number of rescue operations as well as tracked, interdicted and detained vessels engaged in criminal activities in our waters”, he said.
