NIWA MD warns staff against indolence, sabotage to revenue drive

Mr Bola Oyebamiji, Managing Director, National Inland Waterways Authority (NIWA), on Friday warned staff against indolence and any act of sabotage to the revenue drive of the authority.

Oyebamiji gave the warning during the authority’s 2025 2-Day Management Retreat at NIWA headquarters in Lokoja.

He said that the warning became necessary in view of the fact that many of the area offices didn’t perform optimally revenue-wise in 2024, considering the authority’s desire to contribute to the growth and development of the country.

The MD said that the management had earlier chosen to continue to offer the big carrot rather than the stick, “basically to offer equal opportunity to every senior officer to prove him/herself.”

“Unfortunately, the results from this experiment were not encouraging. Consequently, the management is left with no choice, going forward, but to wield the big stick to command performance.

“For instance, it is unfortunate that many of the area offices didn’t perform optimally, revenue-wise. In a recent audit report, many area offices were indicted for failure to act professionally on matters affecting their jurisdictions.

“Again, a situation where some area offices will record as low as N1 million and N2 million as revenue for a whole year is simply unacceptable,” he said.

The NIWA boss said that the authority was expected to remit a substantial part of its receipt from the port development levy in addition to the 50 per cent of its revenue deducted at source.

According to him, many of the area managers failed to cooperate with the debt recovery consultant appointment sometime in 2024 to help recover all outstanding monies owed to the agency.

“Regrettably, in many cases, the supposed debtors were simply untraceable and where available, figures were grossly inconsistent.

“This shameful negative attitude is simply unacceptable and will no longer be tolerated,” he said.

Oyebamiji stated that the retreat was meant to provide an avenue for a broader review of the performance in 2024.

He said that in 2025, new performance parameters had been added to the authority’s performance indicators, in line with the charge of President Bola Tinubu, to the Minister of Marine and Blue Economy, Mr Gboyega Oyetola.

In their goodwill messages, Mr Suleiman Danjuma, Chairman, Senior Staff Union, NIWA and the Chairman, Maritime Workers Union, Mr Zakari Idris, pledged to up their games in the area of performance and revenue drive.

The duo acknowledged the concerns of the MD and the entire NIWA management team, towards the welfare of the staff and their contributions to economic development of Nigeria.