By Kassim Omomia
The House of Representatives, yesterday ordered the Minister of Transportation, Honourable Rotimi Amaechi and the Group Managing Director of Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC), Mele Kyari to revoke the multi-billion-dollar contract awarded to an unregistered foreign shipping company-UNIBROS within seven days.
The House of representatives would have taken this hard-line position because the action of the two government officials negated Nigerian law which specifically states that local contracts must be awarded to indigenous ship owners. This is contained in the Cabotage Act.
Chairman, House Committee on Nigerian Content Development and Monitoring, Hon. Legor Idagbo, issued the notice at the end of the investigative hearing on the petition from the Ship Owners Association of Nigeria (SOAN), following complaints of the inability of indigenous ship owners to benefit from the $14 trillion annual global cabotage market.
Idagbo directed a communication be made to the NNPC and Transport Ministry for more information on the contract.
“This Committee will write to the NNPC to furnish it with every single detail of the contract that was awarded in 2020; every relevant information that is needed because this is an investigative hearing and without NNPC supplying us with this document, as we are now, we do not have any documentation. It is only what the ship owners tell us that we have.
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“So NNPC should furnish us with every single information in relation to this contract.
The same correspondence should be made to the Ministry of Transport to also furnish us with every information they have too regarding the same contract. For us to move forward, we must have all the relevant information just like the DG also said”.
In a letter to the panel, Chairman, Federal Inland Revenue Service (FIRS), Mohammed Nami, affirmed that the contractor, UNIBROS did not register in the Service’s database and has not paid any tax to Federal Government.
Similarly, the Director-General of Nigerian Maritime Administration and Safety Agency (NIMASA), Mr Bashir Jamo, accused the NNPC of frustrating indigenous shipping companies.
Jamo observed that the Minister is empowered by Section 15(1) of the Cabotage Act to grant a provisional licence to an indigenous shipping company by way of waiver for a year, to ensure that it does not cripple the nation’s economy.
He maintained that “even if the indigenous shipping companies do not have the capacity, the provisions of the Cabotage law should be respected”.
