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Nigeria targets world-class ship registry

By Sulaimon Salau
08 August 2019   |   2:38 am
Nigeria has commenced arrangements to upgrade its ship to meet international certification standards, and compete favourably in the global maritime space.

[Dakuku Peterside, NIMASA Boss

Nigeria has commenced arrangements to upgrade its ship to meet international certification standards, and compete favourably in the global maritime space.
 
Against this backdrop, the Nigerian Maritime Administration and Safety Agency (NIMASA), has begun a reassessment of the ship registry with a comprehensive report presented to the management by the committee tasked with the review of activities and operations of the Nigerian Ship Registration Office.
   
Director-General, NIMASA, Dakuku Peterside, while receiving the report of the committee, said the Agency’s drive is to have a world-class ship registry.He said: “NIMASA is working at giving Nigerians a Ship Registry that is respected across the globe and that will be attractive to ship owners, so they can fly the Nigerian flag. In no distant future, our ship registry will be more effective, more efficient and responsive to change, thus, meeting international standards for certification.”  
   
Peterside also said the Agency has commenced the process of automating the Nigerian Ship Registry, noting that preliminary report indicate that diligent implementation of the findings would have a beneficial effect on the Nigerian maritime sector.He said: “We are putting in place the necessary building blocks for Nigeria to be the first African country to achieve a five-star International Standards Certification by 2020. International standard certification for ship registration is our goal at NIMASA.”
   
The Committee Chairman, Emmanuel Ilori, said ship registration and the effectiveness of the established processes in maritime operations are critical in determining the health of a national maritime administration.
   
Ilori stated: “All the committee’s efforts were geared towards making the Nigerian flag globally acceptable. The committee carried out an extensive review of the Nigerian Ship Registry, took cognizance of stakeholders’ opinions and expectations, and carried out comparative analysis of the ship registration processes of some global registries in arriving at the report.

“NIMASA Management should consider and implement submissions contained in the report.”The terms of reference of the nine-man committee, set up in February 2018, included, to examine the status of the ship registry in line with international best practices, advise and recommend requisite improvements of necessity in the registry. The committee was inaugurated on February 27, 2018, to establish a strategy to revamp the ship registration process to raise the profile of the Nigerian flag in the global maritime space.

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