The Port Standing Task Team (PSTT) of the Nigerian Shippers’ Council (NSC) said it had saved the nation’s economy over N5.4 billion from 2021 to 2022 as demurrages that were paid annually by ships calling Nigerian ports.
Speaking in Lagos recently at theeting of the Presidential Port Standing Task Team (PPSTT), Moses Fadipe, the national coordinator of PSTT, said the amount represented an average of $20,000 per vessel demurrage per day.
He attributed the feat to the interventions of the PSTT in restoring order in the port corridor.
Fadipe said the interventions of the PSTT have ensured that over 85 percent of vessels that came through the nation’s ports and terminals left without incident in 2021.
“We have reduced incidences of extortions by both state and non-state actors and enabled free movement of vehicles and persons along the ports’ logistics ring. Also, revenue to the tone of N1,023,000 have accrued to the Federal Government Treasury Single Account through fines collected from offenders of Operation Free the Port Corridor,” he said.
He said the activities of the task team have helped in the actualisation of the objectives of the Executive Order on ease of doing business in Nigeria enshrined in the Nigerian Port Process Manual (NPPM).
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He promised that the successes would be sustained with good strategies of consolidation aimed at surpassing the previous gains.
On touting along the port corridor, Fadipe assured the stakeholders that it would be addressed in less than 30 days starting from April 3.
“It was realised that stoppage of trucks along the port corridor constitutes the biggest encumbrance to the free flow of traffic and this breeds extortion and corrupt practices,” he said.
Fadipe said the Federal Ministry of Transportation had on April 14, 2022, flagged off the exercise to remove all illegal checkpoints and shanties along the port corridor to eliminate traffic gridlock and corrupt practices and impediments to ease of doing business.
Mohammed Bala, a truck owner, said the extortion checkpoints that were removed, had returned to the port corridor.
“Truckers are profusely bleeding due to the activities of these people. From Mile 2 down to Second Gate, these touts are littered there,” he said.
Aloga Ogogbo, the executive secretary of the Nigerian Association of Road Transport Owners, said that extortion was now taking place at odd hours.
