By Jude Michael
A shortfall of 96, 000 thousand seafarers will be experienced in Nigeria’s maritime sector in the year 2026, a maritime expert, Captain Konni Duniya, has warned.
Duniya disclosed this in a paper he presented at the 2024 Lecture Series of the Maritime Academy of Nigeria, Oron, Akwa-Ibom State, titled, “Addressing Human and Institutional Capacity Development in Nigeria’s Maritime Sector Through Stakeholders Partnership’’.
She expressed concern that the country would suffer a huge shortage of adequate and competent seafarers in the coming years if the manpower gap created as a result of war, retirement and disruptions in the sector was not urgently addressed.
Captain Duniya, an alumna of the premier maritime institution, blamed the situation on the domination of Nigeria’s Maritime sector by seafarers of foreign countries, issuance of fraudulent Certificate of Competency CoC, lack of database to validate cadet’s education, training and experience.
She also identified non-compliance with the STCW Convention of the International Maritime Organization, IMO, as one of the major factors and limitations causing low employment opportunities for Nigerian seafarers.
She called on the Federal Government to organise frequent training for existing seafarers and develop capacity building programmes for incoming ones with the use of emerging trends and technologies.
‘Nigeria has been on the IMO STCW white list since 2019, however, Nigerian seafarers are yet to benefit from this achievement due to the inability of Nigeria to sign MOU with the most respected countries like UK, Australia and most of Europe. Signing MOU with such countries will help strengthen our image as a serious maritime nation and open doors for employment of Nigerian seafarers globally.
‘Nigeria is the only country with unemployed seafarers in the world despite the Cabotage Law which seems to have been poorly implemented and the shortage of seafarers globally. There needs to be proper housekeeping in NIMASA to combat issues of seatime and license forgery through the use of block chain and cloud computing.
‘There is the need for Nigeria to market her seafarers to the global market alongside the signing of MOU like Ghana, South Africa and other countries are doing.
Nigeria’s seafarers are left to their fate battling poor wages, welfare and living conditions within Nigerian waters while alternatively accepting lower positions outside Nigerian waters which does not give room for consistent career growth,’ she said, noting that the Maritime academy of Nigeria was currently positioned to compete globally in terms of standards.
Duniya urged the Federal Government to provide the enabling environment for the school to achieve the aims and objectives of its establishment as it relates to seafarers’ training and license issuing.
Stakeholders have also been advised to encourage female seafarers through training, capacity building and employment generation just like their male counterparts so as to achieve the desired growth in Nigeria’s marine and blue economy industry.
It will be recalled that over the years, NIMASA has sent many Nigerians abroad to study various aspects of maritime, including seafarers, but many have since graduated and returned home without jobs.
It was gathered that some of the graduates who benefitted from the programme now loiter around Ikorodu and Liverpool terminals, seeking to assist boat and ferry operators.
Mr. Eric Umezurike, Managing Director First Rit Nigeria Limited, posited that after graduation of the students sponsored by NIMASA under the special scholarship programme, the onus lies on the agency to send them for seatime training.
He noted that Nigeria Seafarers should not be languishing without jobs while their foreign counterparts enjoyed better job placement and welfare.
Umezurike, who is a freight forwarder, noted that the best way out of the present quagmire would be for the Federal Government to establish a national carrier based on Public, Private Partnership, so that maritime student graduates could be deployed after graduation to have seatime experience.
He also called on NIMASA to stop sending what he called select students abroad to study on scholarship when there were maritime institutions in the country.
Another respondent, Mr. Martial Ejiofor, said the government, through NIMASA, should commence the disbursement of $350,000 Cabotage Vessel Finance Fund so as to enhance development of indigenous shipping in the country.
He stated that in a country where the vessels operating within the coastal waters were owned by foreigners, it was pertinent that employment of seafarers would be based on bias, especially when the locals were not qualified.
