Hyacinth Chinweuba
The Managing Director of the Nigerian Ports Authority (NPA), Ms Hadiza Bala Usman has identified lack of licensed trailer parks for trucks operating at the nation’s maritime industry as being responsible for the delay in the implementation of the electronic call up system at the Lagos ports.
Ms Usman, while speaking at the quarterly meeting of the Nigerian Ports Consultative Council (NPCC), in Lagos said however that the agency had issued an advert for licensing of trailer parks adding that upon licensing of trailer parks, only trucks that were parked in those trailer parks will be granted access into the ports locations.
According to her,” For this, trucks must be parked inside those trailer parks and to the extent that certain operators have large fleet and they have their own private trailer parks, we will access the trailer parks and have a call up system deployed to those trailer parks.
“So, what we seek to do is to have trailer parks outside the port locations, we deploy electronic call up, that way, only trucks that have business in the ports will be plying the road on the way through the ports to either deliver or collect goods using the electronic call up system that will call them up only when they are needed”.
While stating that utilization of the inland waterways was key to solving the congestion issue which was the reason the authority had encouraged private operators to come and provide barges for evacuation of cargoes from the ports, she however revealed that NPA had received about 15 proposals from private companies for provision of barges for evacuation of cargoes from Apapa and Tincan Island ports to Ikorodu.
“Out of those 15 requests, we have six of them that have been given approval. We have Connect Rail which is doing movement of cargo between Ikorodu through the terminals. They have moved so many cargoes of solid minerals in and out of the ports. So, this is something we welcome and we also look to see how we can utilize the inland waterways further even away from Ikorodu to other locations that will really ease the congestion out of Tincan and Apapa axis”, she added.
On his part, the Chairman of the Nigerian Ports Consultative Council (NPCC), Otunba Kunle Folarin pointed out that Nigeria was seen to be an import dependent economy which according to him was not good enough for the country adding that as much as it dwell so much on import, Nigerians would continue to look for scarce foreign exchange thereby raising the exchange rate which was about ten years ago, N125 to a Dollar and now about N365.
He therefore that it was only export that would rescue the country hence it was one of the issues on the table for discussion at the meeting.
“We want to look at how we can raise the bar in terms of export promotion. That was why we specifically requested the presence of the Executive Secretary of the Nigerian Export Promotion Council. I believe that we should come with a blue print, we should be able to assist them because most of these agencies are not in the field, they don’t know exactly the practical solutions to what we are going through. They look at it from the public service point of view but when they come down, for example, I can tell you, a lot of Nigerian exports are going through Benin Republic. That is not good and the Benin Republic will be enjoying the value of the shipping, the freight forwarding, the transportation and all that.
“So, we are going to put the Export Promotion Council on the seat, tell us your policy on how to bring back our export cargo”, he said.