Despite public outcry against its concessioning of security of its waters, the federal government has refused to reason with the Nigerian citizens. By contracting Nigeria’s maritime security to a private firm, experts say the federal government has insensitively displayed its lack of understanding of the intensity of maritime security, SAMSON ECHENIM writes
Amidst controversies and criticisms by experts and well-meaning Nigerians, the federal government went ahead to approve the $103.4 million (N16 billion) contract to Global West Vessel Specialist Nigeria Limited (GWVSNL), a private firm believed to be owned by an ex-militant, Mr. Government Ekpemupolo, popularly known as Tompolo.
Even as the Federal Executive Council approved the 10-year concession of maritime security on Lagos to Calabar coastline to GWVSNL two weeks ago, the public-private partnership department of the Nigeria Maritime Administration and Safety Agency (NIMASA) has denied that security itself was part of the contract.?
The federal government did not stop there. It is also using its might to influence experts’ and stakeholders’ position and opposition to what appears to be one of the latest government’s ‘settlement mentalities’.
Even the agency concerned, the Nigeria Maritime Administration and Safety Agency (NIMASA) has been cowed, supposedly by the federal government into making the public believe that the contract is only in the area of provision of the security platforms.
According to sources, the proposition was made to the Federal Executive Council (FEC) through a memorandum from the Federal Ministry of Transport dated, January 5, 2012, titled: Award of Contract for the Strategic Concessioning Partnership with NIMASA to Provide Platform for Tracking Ships and Cargoes, Enforce Regulatory Compliance and Surveillance of the Entire Nigerian Maritime Domain.??????????????????????????????????????????????????
Investigations revealed that, prior to the presentation of the issue before the Federal Executive Council (FEC), the proposal had already passed through the Federal Ministry of Transport, Infrastructural Concession and Regulatory Commission (ICRC), the Bureau of Public Procurement (BPP), as well as the Attorney-General of the Federation.
The development, which has received wide condemnation from maritime stakeholders, as well as opposition political parties, is coming on the heels of botched attempts by the Presidency to create a Maritime Security Agency, a body, which, had it come into being, would have seen the nation’s apex maritime regulatory organ, NIMASA, and the traditional defender of the nation’s territorial waters, the Nigerian Navy (NN), reduced to serving the whims of the nascent agency.
Further details of the memorandum, which is now causing ripples across the industry and the nation’s political landscape, also indicate that NIMASA and Navy are required to “work” with GWVSNL in ensuring safety on the waterways.
In earlier statement issued out to the press at the wake of the concession controversy, the agency’s head of public relations, Hajia Lami Tumaka succinctly said, “The command (NIMASA) is in control of all the platforms including vessels, and their accessories reside with NIMASA which is working jointly with the Nigeria Navy in line with the existing MoU.”
Indeed NIMASA has a running MoU, in which the Maritime Guard Command operated by the Nigerian Navy was established to secure the country’s territorial waters, making any other form of maritime security contract ridiculous.
Stakeholders still ask that if the contract was to provide just the security platforms, what then informed the idea of concession.
The Wikipedia defines a concession as a business operated under a contract or license associated with a degree of EXCLUSIVITY in business within a certain geographical area.
The owner of the concession — the concessionaire — pays either a fixed sum or a percentage of revenue to the entity with the ability to assign exclusive rights for an area or facility. A concession may involve the transfer to the concessionaire of the right to use some existing infrastructure required to carry out a business.
In the case of a public service concession, Wikipedia notes, “A private company enters into an agreement with the government to have the EXCLUSIVE RIGHT to operate, maintain and carry out investment in a public utility (such as a water supply system) for a given number of years.
Clearly, it is only a utility or infrastructure that can be concessioned, not supply of some pieces of equipment.
But as reports of Nigeria’s maritime security concession to Global West Vessels Specialists Ltd continue to flood the nation’s media, the concerned government agency, NIMASA has said it never ceded its maritime security functions to any third party.
The Agency’s head of public-private partnership (PPP), Mr. Rex Ellen, told journalists in Lagos at a recent interactive forum organised by the Maritime Reporters Association of Nigeria on the controversial contract, that following the need to improve security on Nigerian waters, the agency, in view of limited resources, decided to explore the option of PPP in the provision of the vessels and other security apparatuses needed by the agency and the Nigeria Navy in the discharge of their maritime security functions.
NIMASA’s Ellen explained that the coastal, flag and port states responsibilities of the maritime agency were never ceded and remained intact with NIMASA, adding that the concession arrangement was such that it did not require any financial involvement from the agency.
However, a portion of Ellen’s presentation leaves some doubt in the minds of Nigerians: Ellen said GWVSL’s profit would come from the excess revenue generated by NIMASA as a result of the concessionaire’s leased efforts.
Such excess revenue would come after a forecasted annual growth of 19 per cent and it would be shared between the concessionaire and the agency. Now, Nigerians ask: Do we still have such selfless businessmen who are ready to swim in such an uncertain pool of risk?
Again as the head of NIMASA’s PPP department, his plea of incompetence to confirm whether GWVSL is owned by Tomopolo leaves much to be desired.
Describing the contract with the company as a taxi driver- passenger relationship, Ellen said, “The agreement for the concessionaire’s compensation is done in such a way that if NIMASA’s revenue increases significantly above a mutually set benchmark, what is available goes to the concessionaire and this figure would be shared between the agency (federal government) and the concessionaire. We did a historical review of our revenue performance and raised it by 19 per cent as our annual growth forecast.”
“The NIMASA Act 2007, Sec.3 Sub sec. 3 permits the agency to involve a third party if need be in carrying out its responsibilities effectively. There is so much to do in carrying out its coastal, flag and ports states functions including environmental, safety and Cabotage compliances and these require a lot of cooperation with many bodies.
We need effective operational capacities and these operational capacities begin and end with platforms”.
But sub sec. 4 of that Act says that such a third party should be a state or the FCT, a government or its agency, or a natural person, as was pointed out by the national president of the Association of Nigerian Licensed Customs Agents (ANLCA).
The senior special adviser to the President on Maritime services, Leke Oyewole, also denied the concession saga, saying that “the Government did not concession maritime security to any company.
What the government has done is out-source the supply and provision of platforms like patrol boats and other material needed to secure both the waters and off-shore operations. The firm will not execute maritime security; Navy and NIMASA will implement maritime security.”
Interestingly, all these denials are coming days after the memorandum from the Federal Ministry of Transport dated January 5, 2012, titled: “Award of Contract for the Strategic Concessioning Partnership with NIMASA to Provide Platform for Tracking Ships and Cargoes, Enforce Regulatory Compliance and Surveillance of the Entire Nigerian Maritime Domain, spelling out the concession details, which include patrol of the country’s waters from Lagos to Calabar has been published.?????
Even as this is going on, it has not been without some intriguing scenes. The chairman of the Indigenous Shipowners Association of Nigeria (ISAN), Isaac Jolapamo, who had earlier complained of having some of his member harassed at sea by the zealous GWVSL, as it begins operation, made a U-turn as the heat from the government pours on him.
Speaking with the press, Jalopamo had said he had received several alerts from some of his colleagues that GWVSL’s officials and agents had allegedly been harassing them across the seas, asserting that the association would not have anything to do with a private maritime concessionaire.
Jolapamo explained that on receiving these complaints, he immediately called the director-general of the Nigeria Maritime Administration and Safety Agency (NIMASA), Mr. Ziakede Patrick Akpobolokemi, requesting him to “call these people to order.”
Jolapamo said, “I told him in a plain language that we will not deal with any private company asking to regulate our vessels, except officials of NIMASA and the Nigerian Navy who are statutorily empowered to maintain security in our waterways.
“None of the members of ISAN should allow any of their ships to be intercepted, stopped, boarded, searched or regulated by officials or agents of the said private firm”.??
Reacting to the circumstances that led to the emergence of the contract, the ISAN boss described the issue as “absolute madness for somebody to entrust the security of its waterways to a private concern. We will not be part of this rubbish, but if they want to be harassing foreign ships, good luck to them”.
He, however, added that even in the case of foreign vessels, it spells national embarrassment to ask foreign ship operators to subject their vessels to the scrutiny of a private firm.
Reacting to Mr. Ellen’s presentations, a former president of the National Association of Master Mariners, Capt. Johnson Ogun, advised NIMASA to always work with the stipulations of the International Maritime Organisation (IMO), being Nigeria’s representative at the United Nations maritime agency, to avoid being sanctioned.
While noting that NIMASA ought to have done generous sensitisation, as well involved relevant stakeholders, Capt. Ogun stressed that the agency must not work in isolation and should apply care when it comes to executing its security functions.
He said, “NIMASA represents Nigeria at IMO. Its Act is tied to that of the IMO. IMO is of safety of lives at sea, so its recommendations are good sources for NIMASA to draw from. IMO will not deal with private organisations when it comes to security. Again, any government should be able to fund its organisations that are into safety and security and not to leave that in the hands of private firms”.
The chairman of the Nigeria Ports Consultative Council, Otunba Kunle Folarin, said by his understanding of the matter on ground, the federal government seemed more interested in money making than in security. He therefore, advised that government must not always focus on revenue generation, but take issues such as that of maritime security paramount to revenue.