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Steve Agbota
The Chairman, House of Representatives Committee on Privatisation and Commercialisation, Mr. Victor Akinjo, has raised the alarm that the country was losing
about N600 billion monthly to the gridlock around the Lagos seaports.
But, in order to tackle the challenge, he said the Federal Government has concluded plans to engage relevant stakeholders to address the menace.
Speaking yesterday during a facility tour of the Ocean and Cargo Terminal in Warri, Akinjo described the N600 billion monthly figure as a huge lost.
“When we interface with importers and exporters in Lagos, we discovered that the gridlock is costing Nigeria N600 billion monthly. We took it up on Wednesday at the level of the parliament that there was the need to engage all stakeholders to see what could be done urgently.”
According to him, the purpose of the visit was to interface with the maritime operators and regulators, saying seaports is the gateway to any economy in the world.
“You cannot carry tonnage of goods through the air, it must come through the water. The only way to achieve this is to ensure that our ports are efficient and effective. The essence of the visit is to interface with the operators and regulators and take on issues I call privatisation laboratory and find ways to solving the issues.”
He however, commended the management of Ocean and Cargo Terminal, urging them to aggressively pursue the delivery on its obligations as contained in the agreement.
“The committee under the Speaker of the House of Representatives, Femi Gbajabiamila, in concurrence with our legislative agenda, are very concerned that there must be fairness, justice and financial equity in things we do.We will not allow your investment to go down the drain nor allow the regulators to over task you. But more importantly to allow Nigerians to benefit from every transaction.”
