Chairman/Chief Executive Officer of Integrated Oil and Gas Nigeria Limited, Capt. Emmanuel Iheanacho, spoke with Vanguard’s Maritime Correspondent, GODFREY BIVBERE, on several issues ranging from the solution to the failed road network and traffic situation in Apapa, the operation of tank farms, challenges to shipping development amongst others.
Excerpts:
WHAT is the solution to the traffic situation in Apapa?
There is a deficit in terms of roads that is available and the volume of traffic that goes in and out of the port. If you would recall that the road infrastructure was built so many years ago and of course road infrastructure is in relation to a particular traffic size. So, if the traffic size increases either in volume or in terms of the structure of that traffic, then policy planners need to make adequate provisions and ensure there are roads to take care of the new development.
The problem we have today is that we haven’t seen the benefits of development in infrastructure, developing additional roads and redesigning the areas that are very close to the port. In actual fact, I was moving around Apapa recently I was pointing out the fact that there were lots of obsolescent buildings in the port environment that are not really of no economic use anymore.
Additional infrastructure
It might be a good idea really if you can have people who are really forward looking to look at the possibility of acquiring some of these places, knocking them down, developing additional infrastructure by way of truck parks, access roads, and the problems we certainly have now will not be there.
But in a situation where the development of infrastructure in relation to roads and truck parks is static, and population is continuously growing and a growth in population results to growth in trade and there is also a dimension in terms of the types of goods that we now see passing through the ports, you are bound to have the chaos that we have now.
But it isn’t something we can endure forever; it is something that I think that a special taskforce should be empowered to look at these problems and look at possible long term solutions to it.
What about the issue of Tank Farms?
Thank you very much for bringing up the issue of the tank farms. I would like you to carry out a little survey when you leave here this afternoon. Walk all the way down to Liverpool for instance and look at the number and types of trucks that you have and then from Liverpool, walk all the way down to Ibafo, and look at the number of trucks that you see on the road and the types and it will give you an idea exactly where the problem lies. I do not think that the problem lies with the tank farms; I think the problem lies mostly with the container vehicles.
So people very quickly like to say is the tank farms. Well, maybe there might be some elements of doubt that may be associated with the tank farms but it isn’t the tank farms. I think it’s actually the port bound traffic that goes into the port and out of the port and the major problem that the road system that exist is absolutely too small in relation to the volume of goods that is travelling back and forth from the port.
Some operators are advocating for shipping companies to have their own holding bay?
Well, it is good that you have talked about shipping companies. A shipping company runs shipping business and the ownership of holding bay for trucks is not really a function of a shipping company.
There must be an overall global regulator or an entity that sees beyond shipping and the issues of trucks that come down there, that will make those propositions for us to have things that can make it easy for trucks to make a transit to and fro the port without too much problems. A shipping company is a shipping company and someone who invests money is building a truck park that is his own job.
But one of the things I said earlier is that the time has come for us to have a look at the volume and the types of goods that are going in and out of the ports; and we also have to look at what really will be optimally best in terms of the road structure, the size and capacity of the roads and the capacity of the truck parks that will serve these requirements.
So I think that the problem lies clearly in the fact that we don’t have one organization, not the port authority or road transport authority but an organization that takes a global overview of everything that is going on and make recommendation to the government as in what should be done.
I think such a body or committee should be empowered to very quickly look at the situation in Apapa port. Apapa port is the absolute economic heart of the nation and if we have a situation when goods cannot move back and forth then our economy is bound to suffer.
Looking at the recent government’s policy on Ease of Doing Business and looking at the situation on ground in relation to port access roads, do you think we are getting it right?
Well that’s a big issue, of course there is a big difference between somebody wishing for something and for that thing to happen. You could wish for us to have a situation where goods can be cleared within 24 hours. Well, if goods are cleared in 24 hours and there are no roads for them to pass, then the purpose of talking about clearing goods in 24 hours becomes defeated.
So, I think everything that has to do with the movement of goods back and forth from the ports is related to the availability of roads, the availability of truck parks, the process by which the goods are cleared through the ports, all of these things should be subjected to proper scrutiny and this can be done by a committee that could be set up by the federal government that really will have elements drawn from all the different areas; shipping, port authority, road transport, public planners etc, to look at these things in a holistic way and to proffer recommendations as to how these horrible problems can indeed be dwelt with.
You talked a lot about the traffic situation in Apapa, but it is no longer news to maritime operators. Stakeholders proffer solutions but yet the problem still remains.
When you say the issue of traffic congestion in the port is no longer news, it doesn’t mean that the problem has gone away. When you talk about people organizing seminars and they have resolutions that are taken at the end of the seminar and nothing is done, it doesn’t mean that the problem has gone away.
The only thing is that there is a discontinuity in terms of the carriage of information between those who organize those seminars and the people who make policy. If for instance, somebody who organizes a conference says “I must make sure that the resolutions reached at the end of this conference would be brought to the attention of the government” and he then takes a copy of that resolution and send it to the presidency, certainly somebody somewhere would have a look at it and even if they didn’t deal with it at the presidency, they will direct it to the particular agency of government that have responsibility to deal with it.
We should keep talking about it because if we stop talk about it and say well we’ve been talking about it for a 100 years and therefore we think that with the passage of time this thing would have gone away, it can’t go away.
Rail traffic from the ports
Nobody is even talking about rubbish, rubbish heaps contesting for space with trucks.
Nigerian Port Authority has been striving hard to make Nigerian ports a hub for West Africa. In your on view as a major stakeholder, what do you think the NPA should do to attain this status?
Well, when you talk about hub status, one of the things that I don’t want to talk about is this clichés. You know we have been talking Nigeria ports as a hub for West Africa. Why would we be a hub? We would be a hub if we have all the facilities for the efficient movement of goods out of ships and into the hinterland. But if we have a situation when our ports are choked up and our own goods cannot come out of the port, who wants to patronize a hub where the person who owns the hub cannot even clear his own goods not to talk about the goods of a third party.
So when you ask the question what can be done? It is the subject matter of our discussion this morning that we want to be able to clear all these trucks, repair the roads into and out of the ports, conceive of additional roads into and out of the ports, conceive of the possibility that we could be using rail traffic from the ports and outside. So there are so many things that we need to do.
What we need to do also is that we need to take a look at the buildings that have been here for so many years for maybe 50 to 100 years, are they still economically viable? Would it be possible for us to look at some of those areas and offer to buy out those buildings from the owners and to redesign it so that all the things that we need in terms of parking spaces have to be developed in close proximity to the ports. It is not something that can be done on a day-to-day basis.
There must, first of all, be a recognition that the port system of Lagos is choked to death, that there is an adverse impact o the Nigerian economy if the port system is not working efficiently and that we need to empanel a commission, a bi-partisan commission that really will cut across all the different industries, shipping companies, port operators, regulators, customs, immigration and everybody is involved in that committee and they sit down and first and foremost they define exactly what the problem is. Of course the definition has to be assisted by the availability of empirical data on what were the assumptions when these ports were built so many years ago? What were the assumptions in terms of the structure of the cargos that went back and forth, and what are we having at this very point in time?
If you see that there is a deficit in terms of an increase in the volume of cargos in relation to what was originally planned, then it means that you have to plan to have additional road networks and to also make provision for some of the trucks that come to park in the vicinity of the ports. I don’t think that there is any way we can sit down and talk about it and think that we’ll wake up one day and the problem goes away.
Concerning port development and expansion, terminal operators argue that private jetties and tank farms are one of the reasons why there cannot be expansion in the ports?
Why will they say that? You are making the assumption that a private jetty is not part of the port infrastructure. The private jetty and the public jetty contribute. The only difference between a private jetty and a public jetty is that a private jetty is in private ownership. It receives goods that are coming in and when it is licensed to do so, also serves as an outlet. Why would you then want to knock them off?
Talking about tank farms, they are also part of the port infrastructure because without them you really will not be able to distribute fuel and very soon, one problem that we are talking about which is the problem of all these trucks here, will now become a problem of there is no way that you are going to land your fuel.
:Vanguard
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