Amaechi dumped committee’s report on new national fleet 12 months after– Akinsoji
A top member of the federal government’s implementation committee constituted last year by the Minister of Transportation, Rotimi Amaechi to screen shipping operators interested in acquiring part of the 60 percent holding for Nigerians in the proposed national fleet, Engineer Olu Akinsoji has opened up 12 months after submission of the report.
In an interview, he decried that 12 months after his committee submitted its report to the Minister, the government has turned attention to other things, thus frustrating the readiness of Nigerian and local investors in the plan.
Business Hilights recalls that shortly after his appointment as Minister of Transportation, Amaechi announced that government has concluded plans to refloat the collapsed national shipping line and later changed the narrative, saying government will partner with some international shipping agency to float the line.
Only weeks latter, the same minister announced plans to partner with local shippers on a public private partnership (PPP) to drive a new national fleet. This latest idea was welcomed by stakeholders’ leading to the constitution of the implementation committee whose report has remained in the drawer for one year now.
Explaining more, Akinsoji, a renowned Marine Engineer and Nigeria’s former Alternate Permanent Representative to the International Maritime Organization (IMO), said “The committee submitted its interim report and implementation committee are working on it but I will say we are very slow and we cannot measure the achievement. What the committee and the minister in concurrence is working on is to begin to create an environment for Nigeria to be able to have their own ships or even for foreign investors to come into the system and have confidence in putting money in to buying ships and flying Nigerian flag and taking advantage of the cargo and employing Nigerians on their ships to earn foreign exchange”.
“These are the concepts but I have not seen that emerging yet and that is because in my opinion, the environment has not been created and the environment is not yet attractive and I wish that more political seriousness is put into this to allow it to emerge because it is a fantastic initiative. But then dragging our feet cannot gain us the pathway to achieving the objectives of that initiative.
“It is thing of worry. I as a member of that committee I thank the minister for given me the opportunity to be there but I am not too happy that we cannot count on the gains of making the objective of that initiative. We spent so much time on it but I think there is no enough political will to push this thing to effectiveness.
While Aknisoji called for implementation of the report, other stakeholders who barred their minds with our correspondent said lack of political will is fueling policy inconsistency in the industry.
