(Our Response to NIWA’s Rejoinder)
Last two weeks, we published an editorial with the above title to which NIWA came out with a rejoinder berating the editorial and Business & Maritime West Africa, and reeling out what it called achievements of NIWA in the four years of Dr Moghalu at the waterways authority.
While we acknowledge that it is not proper for the press to reply to rejoinders from public and private institutions or individuals who feel offended by their publications, we feel compelled to do so in this case where the usual lies and abstract achievements have been dished out to Nigerians by a government agency.
It is equally important to reply in order to drive it home to government agencies that they can no longer intimidate or browbeat the press with the well-worn cliché of “sponsored blackmail” or just dismissing stories in public interests as baseless, untrue and unfounded. Nigerian press is rising to their constitutional challenge of holding public officials accountable to the people, making public officials accountable for what they do and say, thereby keeping them on their toes to serve the people they are being paid to serve.
Therefore, seeing the editorial as sponsored blackmail will not deter us or any organ of the press that wants to perform its constitutional duty. As a media platform that has reported the maritime industry for over two decades, we will continue to expose inefficiency, lack of accountability and non-performance of public officers, and will not trade our freedom of free speech for a mess of pottage.
Before we can look at some of the absurd claims of NIWA in its rejoinder, it is pertinent to state that an x-ray of the activities and achievements of the waterways authority must be based on how far it has discharged its core responsibilities and functions as a government agency, not on trite and recycled “achievements” that do not really impact the people. For the sake of refreshing the mind, NIWA’s functions as stipulated by law and displayed by NIWA itself on its website can be summarized thus:
Provide regulation for inland water navigation;
Ensure development of infrastructural facilities for a national inland waterways connectivity with economic centres using the River Ports and nodal points for inter-nodal exchanges;
Ensure the development of indigenous technical and managerial skills to meet the challenges of modern inland waterways transportation.
Specifically, the functions and powers of NIWA as enunciated and documented in laws establishing NIWA (NIWA ACT CAP N47 LFN 2004) are: To
- undertake capital and maintenance dredging;
- undertake hydrological and hydrographic surveys:
- design ferry routes:
- survey, remove, and receive derelicts, wrecks and other obstructions from in land waterways;
- operate ferry services within the inland waterways system;
- undertake installation and maintenance of lights, buoys and all navigational aids along water channels and banks;
- issue and control licenses for inland navigation, piers, jetties, dockyards;
- examine and survey inland water crafts and shipyard operators;
- grant permit and licenses for sand dredging, pipeline construction, dredging of slots and crossing of waterways by utility lines, water intake, rock blasting and removal;
- grant licenses to private inland waterway operators;
- approve designs and construction of inland river crafts;
- approve and control all
(i) jetties, dockyards, piers within the inland waterways;
(ii) advertising within the right-of-way of the waterways:
reclaim land within the right-of-way;
undertake the construction, administration and maintenance of inland river-ports and jetties;
provide hydraulic structures for river and dams, bed and bank stabilisation, barrages, groynes;
collect river lolls;
undertake the production, publication and broadcasting of navigational publications, bulletins and notices, hydrological year hooks, river charts and river maps;
carry out consultancy and contractual services;
represent the Government of Nigeria at national and international commissions that deal with navigation and inland water transportation;
subject to the provisions of the Environmental Impact Assessment Act, carry out environmental impact assessment of navigation and other dredging activities within the inland water and its right-of-ways;
undertake erection and maintenance of gauges, kilometre boards, horizontal and vertical control marks;
advise government on all border mailers that relate to the inland waters;
undertake acquisition, leasing and hiring of properties;
run cruise boats;
carry out boat repairs, boat construction and dockyard services; and
clear water hyacinth and other aquatic weeds.
These are the functions of the National Inland Waterways Authority. One would ask the Authority to sincerely assess itself in line with these statutory functions and tell Nigerians its score card. Have the activities of the agency under Moghalu, provided safety on the nation’s inland waterways? How much of capital and maintenance dredging have been sincerely undertaken in the inland waterways as to make them navigable? How many water channels and banks have been provided with lights, bouys and navigational aids, before one talks of maintenance?
We can take all the above-listed functions one after the other, and assess how much of the function has been executed or is being executed by Moghalu. Does one talk of wreck removals or clearing of water hyacinths that has become an avenue for relevant government agencies for siphoning public funds, with each of them yearly claiming to have spent huge sums of money on the same channels.
It’s been stated that NIWA was created to “ensure development of infrastructural facilities for a national inland waterways connectivity with economic centres using the river ports as nodal points for inter-nodal exchanges; ensure the development of indigenous technical and managerial skills to meet the challenges of modern inland waterways transportation.” How much of this has the Authority done under Moghalu?
Nigerians want to see the impact of any management of NIWA on their lives and the economy, and not on its workers, the headquarters and area offices as listed in the so-called ‘achievements’.
Now let’s take a look at some of the so-called achievements of the inland waterways authority under Moghalu as reeled out in the rejoinder. According to the rejoinder, in the first year of Dr. Moghalu in office, NIWA procured 3T, 5T and 25T forklifts, one (1) Mobile Boom crane 80 Ton at Baro Port. But one can vividly recall that when Baro Port was deceptively “commissioned” in January 2019 by former President Buhari, NIWA said the new port was fitted with a harbour crane, reach stacker, and three forklifts of various tonnages, among others.
Everyone knows that Baro Port has not been working since that public deceit. So is it credible that Dr Moghalu, after coming to NIWA in October 2019, nine months later, will go and buy additional cranes and forklifts for a non-functioning port, more so after saying it is looking for a concessionaire for the port? The answer to this question is very obvious.
NIWA claims in the rejoinder that the Onitsha Port is now in operation and yielding economic value to the nation through the efforts of Moghalu who successfully concessioned and handed over the port to Elysium Consortium Limited. It is true that the concession of the Onitsha Port to Elysium Consortium was completed under the regime of Dr. Moghalu, but the process had been on before Moghalu, and would have been completed save for legal tussles.
The claim that the port is working and providing economic value to the nation is spurious. Can NIWA provide statistics to support this? If the port is working, will the Governor of Anambra State, Chukwuma Soludo, sign a recent agreement with Universal Elysium to make the port work? Can Onitsha Port work without dredging the River Niger?
There is no need taking the so-called achievements as dished out year by year. Suffice it to say that a thorough look at the claims will reveal that they are a mere compilation of NIWA’s activities over the years. They do not represent the achievements of Moghalu. All that his predecessors did are all included in the rejoinder.
This assertion is confirmed by the statement: “Commissioning of NIWA jetty at Tin-can island Lagos, by Senator Dr. Olorunnimbe Adeleke Mammora the then Hon. Minister of State for Health, Building of new office complex at NIWA Headquarters Lokoja, Inauguration of Taskforce to patrol and enforce waterways protocols in the Lagos waterways. Which is being replicated in all Area Offices. This mistake by the compiler gives the dubbed documents away. How can Mamora’s commissioning of a project be part of Moghalu’s achievements?
In addition, a mere look at the “achievements” year by year will show that it is not possible for any government agency to execute these numerous projects in one year. See year two and three in particular. If all these have been done by NIWA, why do we still have many problems on the waterways?
It must be reiterated that Nigerians can no longer tolerate government and public officials serving themselves and claiming to serve the people. The era of false claims, double speaks and outright deceit is gradually coming to an end. Many of the achievements as outlined in the rejoinder are just wild and abstract. For instance, in the four years under review, there are claims such as: wreck removals, clearing of debris and water hyacinth from the nation’s waterways, without mentioning which river channels where these projects took place and amount of public funds spent.
The same can be said of “Removal of rickety water crafts from the waterways, Engagement with the Navy, Nigerian Police, and other relevant security authorities. NIWA formed partnership with them to safeguard the waterways.” Where were the rickety water crafts removed and how many of them. How can having meetings with the police, the navy and other security agencies become an achievement worthy of celebration?
Talking about serving themselves and claiming to serve the people, one cannot understand how distribution of palliatives to staff to cushion effects of Covid-19 pandemic can be listed as achievements for the people. The same with paying courtesy visits to fellow government officials.
With all the voluminous claims of achievements of NIWA under Moghalu, one continues to wonder why the annual harvest of deaths on the nation’s inland waterways. The country has recorded over 982 deaths in the waterways under Muoghalu. Boat operators have often condemned the inability of NIWA to live up to expectations, only to blame every accident on the waterways on overloading and not wearing life jackets. The national association of boat operators has often blamed the majority of the accidents on the inland waterways on NIWA’s negligence and “system failures such as mapping, dredging and wreck removals”. They see these as the major issues on the waterways. Yet NIWA unabashedly claims it’s been doing all this while the nation continues to lose hundreds of lives every year on the waterways.
It is interesting to note that following the latest boat mishaps that claimed many lives in Niger and Adamawa states, President Bola Ahmed Tinubu has ordered a thorough and comprehensive investigation into the recurring boat tragedies that have been claiming too many lives in the country. The probe will involve government agencies, including law enforcement, maritime safety and transportation safety authorities collaborating to identify the causes of the annual disasters. It is equally interesting that the President said government agencies would be held accountable for the regulatory safety lapses.
By the time this is done, the world would know if there has been real regulation on Nigeria’s inland waterways, and where the lapses have been coming from. It will then be easy to separate the lies of NIWA from the truth.
