Stakeholders in the shipping industry in Aba, the commercial hub of Abia State, have appealed to the Federal and Abia State Governments to ensure that the Isiala Ngwa Inland Container Depot (ICD) comes into operation to serve port users without further delay.
They also urged the Federal Government to speed up the declaration of the ICDs as origin and destination ports to enable the international community to recognise them in the shipping trade.
The stakeholders in a communiqué issued after a seminar on port regulation, organised by the Nigerian Shippers Council (NSC) Aba coordinating office, also urged the National Assembly, to as a matter of urgency; facilitate the enactment of the enabling law for the NSC to function as a regulator.
They also appealed to Government to eliminate what they called “monopolistic policies and tendencies,” which according to them gives one port overbearing competitive edge over other ports.
The participants called for the support of all stakeholders to enable the NSC to resolve all the challenges facing the ports sector.
They also demanded that only Nigerian nationals should be shipping agents in the local ports and urged Port Concessionaires to provide facilities to enable shippers load goods in the ports to save time and cost.
They also urged the Federal Government to be consistent with its policies to make the ports efficient in line with international best practices.
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According to them, the NSC should wield a big stick against erring operators to ensure that the sector is sanitised as well as adopt international best practices to function effectively as a regulator.
To ease transportation of goods within the country, they urged the Federal Government to remove Tank Farms around ports and create truck-transit parks.
The seminar with the theme, “Port regulation: A panacea to post concession challenges in Nigeria’s ports sector, was organised to create awareness on the new role of the Nigerian Shippers Council as ports economic regulator and enlighten stakeholders on elements for costing and pricing of shipping services in a regulated port system and the way forward.
It also intended to elicit discussions on stakeholders’ perception of the new role of the Council as well as examine current port processes with a view to identifying possible bottlenecks and ways of eliminating them to enthrone efficiency.
