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NIMASA promotes anti-piracy efforts in Gulf of Guinea

One of the attack boats under Nigeria's deep blue project

Eyewitness News

Of all the 20 African countries which border the Gulf of Guinea, Nigeria is unarguably the only country at the forefront to restore security to the notoriously troubled region.

The country has consistently committed huge resources and engaged in strategic partnerships with foreign countries in a bid to decimate pirate attacks in the region.

The most ambitious of such commitment was the multi-million dollars deep blue project which was launched and deployed in June 2021 aimed at keeping the Nigerian territorial waters safe and by extension, to keep the dare-devil pirates at bay from the Gulf of Guinea.

In addition, the Nigerian Maritime and Safety Agency (NIMASA), the lead government agency in charge of maritime safety and security in the country, has also embarked on an international campaign to sell the efforts of the Federal government in the Gulf of Guinea.

One of such several efforts to sell to the international community the gradual declining activities of pirates in the Gulf of Guinea was by the Director-General of NIMASA, Dr. Bashir Jamoh at an international round table entitled “Seafarers and Maritime Capacity at the Core of Africa’s Shipping Future,” where he highlighted recent declines both in kidnappings and attacks on ships at anchor in the country.

This campaign was part of measures by the Nigerian authorities to highlight the decline of piracy in the Gulf of Guinea as they work to rehabilitate the reputation of the region and attract new investments.

The Nigerian government was promoting the overall decline in activity while saying that it was also working to expand the efforts and further involve forces ranging from the police to the navy to continue the progress.

“There has been a decline in piracy attacks in the Gulf of Guinea, as the region recorded 28 incidents of piracy and armed robbery in the first nine months of 2021, in comparison to 46 for the same period in 2020,” Jamoh said during his presentation.

“Crew kidnappings in the region have dropped with only one crew member kidnapped in Q3 2021, compared to 31 crew members taken in five separate incidents during Q3 2020.”

However, stakeholders said these presentations highlighting the decline in kidnappings, came as details continued to filter out on the latest incident involving a containership in the region.

The Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Poland provided some of the first official details following reports by the security services and a brief statement from the Danish Foreign Ministry.

The Polish Ministry confirmed that one of the six individuals taken was a Polish citizen and said it was working on the return of their seafarer.

The incident took place on December 13, but there was some confusion on the exact number of people involved as some crew members were thought to be hiding on the containership.

The containership, the Greek-owned Tonsberg, is a 5,551 TEU vessel operating under charter to CMA CGM and is registered in Liberia.

It is believed that six crew members were kidnapped and a seventh received a gunshot wound and was being treated aboard a Danish frigate.

Dryad reported that this latest incident brought the total to 10 incidents with 76 crew abducted this year.

Speaking at the conference, Nigeria officials cited the economic impact as well as environmental pollution from the piracy activity. They admitted that the attacks were taking place in anchorages and various parts of the country, but said they were meeting with the police to better coordinate efforts with the Navy.

“It impacted the seafarers and shipping economically such as loss of revenue due to illegal activities, high insurance premium, a threat to commerce, socially such as arm and drug smuggling, and kidnapping,” they said during the presentation but promised that they were committed to continuing the progress cited by Jamoh.

The NIMASA boss however disclosed that various interventions had been introduced to address the situation, including passage of new legislation and review of local laws.

In June 2021, Nigeria launched a coordinated programme known as Deep Blue which was outfitted with a broad range of equipment to combat piracy both at the bases as well as in the country’s territorial waters.

International forces are seeking to supplement the effort, but as the Danes highlighted in the recent incident, they were barred from following the pirates with the kidnapped crew when they entered territorial waters.

Concerned stakeholders however warned that the Nigerian government should not concede the initiatives in the fight against pirates in the Gulf of Guinea to the foreign powers as the case seems to be at the present.

They advised that the fight should be a joint efforts with the Nigeria Navy and other local forces to earn Nigeria the deserved respect in the international community.

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Danish court returns guilty verdict on Nigerian pirate —- remands him in prison

The Eyewitness reporter

A Danish court on Monday found a Nigerian guilty of endangering the lives of Danish military personnel in a shooting incident last November involving Denmark’s navy and a crew of suspected Nigerian pirates in the Gulf of Guinea.

However, the court declined to sentence the Nigerian, Lucky Frances, 40, despite a call from the prosecutor for a prison sentence of 12 to 15 months.

As part of international anti-piracy efforts, Denmark deployed a frigate to the Gulf of Guinea in October last year.

The following month, it intervened in an alleged attack on a commercial vessel, killing four pirates and capturing four other suspects.

“The court emphasized that the 40-year-old Nigeria, together with the other perpetrators, fulfilled all the signs of piracy and had to be described as a pirate group,” Copenhagen city court said in a statement.

Frances, who was injured during a firefight with Danish navy personnel in the November clash, was taken to Denmark for prosecution in January after being treated at a hospital in Ghana.

Danish authorities deemed it unsafe to release him in Ghana. His leg was amputated as a result of his injuries.

Frances was exempted from any legal consequences due to his medical condition and the fact that charges against the other three suspected pirates had been dropped, his lawyer Jesper Storm Thygesen told Reuters.

Charges against the three other suspected Nigerian pirates were dropped in January after Denmark failed to find a country in the region to take them.

They were released from detention on the frigate and put to sea in a small dinghy in the Gulf of Guinea.

Frances will remain in custody until both sides have decided whether to appeal against the verdict, Thygesen said.

Headlines

Possession of NIN by passengers now requirement for boarding trains—Sambo

— as government shifts resumption of Abuja-Kaduna rail services to December

The Eyewitness reporter

As part of the multi-layer security measures put in place on the troubled Abuja-Kaduna train route, the federal government has announced that no passenger will be allowed to buy tickets for train services without a National Identification Number (NIN).

In addition, no minor will be allowed onboard unless registered by an adult with a NIN who cannot register more than four minors per trip.

Reviewing the security measures put in place ahead of the resumption of the Abuja-Kaduna train route, the Minister of Transportation, Mu’azu Sambo, said these and other security initiatives which the government has taken are necessary to forestall the reoccurrence of the sad event which occurred on March 28th, 2022 on the route when the train was derailed by insurgents who killed and kidnapped passengers.

The minister, who on Sunday at Kaduna expressed satisfaction over the level of security measures in place, also said the steps taken so far will also stop ticket racketeering which has been the order of the day among the railway staff on the route.

The Minister also expressed confidence that the measures put in place are adequate enough for the train service to commence.” There is sensitive equipment that we have deployed that I will not reveal. The other thing I can tell you is that for every journey, the train is monitored every second on the screen.

” The train driver can see from a distance if there are any threats on the tracts that will enable him to match the break long before getting to the threat, and that is why I am telling you confidently,” said the Minister.

The Minister debunked the rumour that train services will resume on Monday, adding that the newly introduced measures will delay the resumption of business along the corridor for a few more days for passengers to get acquainted with the new protocol involved in train boarding before it will resume services.

“We have not said that train services will start tomorrow. I want to be very categorical about that.

“Now, we have introduced a new system before you buy a ticket. The purchase of a ticket requires you to provide a phone number and a national identification number in order to profile you because that is the beginning of the security checks. So at any point in time when a train moves from one station to another, we know who and who are on board.

“If you don’t have a NIN you are not going to board our train, it is as simple as that. If you are a minor, an adult will register for you and an adult can only register for not more than four minors.

“Now, we want to give sufficient time for the Nigerian public to listen to these two requirements, to assimilate this new system.

“So if you go and start tomorrow, a lot of people will be disgruntled. Why didn’t they tell us that this is a new way of doing it? Why didn’t they give us adequate time to do it? So we want to give you adequate time. Definitely between 3,4,5 days, certainly not more than a week.

Sambo assured Nigerians that a smooth and secured train ride is guaranteed while noting that the trains will not travel at night for now, while there is also going to be a review in train fares.

“I can assure you that we are a compassionate government and will consider the masses in the review of the train fare.”

We are not going to tell you what we have done. It is a security matter and I have no apologies for that.

“We’ll be monitoring it on a daily basis and improve on wherever we find some snags”.

“The ticketing called e-ticketing has already been contracted to a company, called secure ID. That concession has gone through the entire concession process under extant laws, including approval by the Federal Executive Council. So that concession remains in place for the duration of the concession period, which I think is 10 years”.

Sambo said that although only God can guarantee maximum security, he assured Nigerians that everything is in place to guarantee a secured and smooth train ride.

“We are not going to tell you what we have done. It is a security matter and I have no apologies for that.

“We’ll be monitoring it on a daily basis and improve on wherever we find some snacks”.

The Minister assured that Secured ID would continue to handle the e-ticketing services.

“The ticketing called e-ticketing has already been contracted to a company called secure ID. That concession has gone through the entire concession process under extant laws, including approval by the Federal Executive Council. So that concession remains in place for the duration of the concession period, which I think is 10 years”.

The Minister was accompanied by the Minster of State for Transportation, Ademola Adegoroye; Minister of Water Resources Eng. Suleiman Adamu; Managing Director, Nigeria Railway Corporation Fidet Okhiria; Chairman Governing Board Nigeria Railway Corporation Ibrahim Musa.

Headlines

As Nigerdock recants operational breaches, FG may lift suspension on the facility

The Eyewitness reporter

The Federal Government has expressed its readiness to lift the suspension order on Nigerdock following its willingness to abide by the rules and its contributions to the growth of the National economy.

The Minister of Transportation, Mu’azu Jaji Sambo, stated this recently when he visited the firm in Lagos in the company of the Minister of State for Transportation, Prince Ademola Adegoroye and some Management Staff of the Ministry.

Addressing the Chief Executive Officer, Nigerdock, Maher Jarmakani and other officials of the company, the Minister pointed out that the reason why they were suspended was as a result of complaints from other Terminal Operators, saying Nigerdock had operating advantages over them.

“What led to your suspension was that I received complaints from Terminal Operators, saying that you are not on the same level with them. In the sense that they pay more to the government than you do. You’re likely to attract freight at a much lower cost to the detriment of businesses”, the Minister disclosed.

He, therefore, urged them to liaise with Nigerian Ports Authority (NPA) to work out all the operational licenses needed to enable them to operate and the latter will forward the same to the Minister of Transportation whose prerogative it is to give approvals.

Speaking further, the Minister said: “We will never do anything to undermine the things you are doing here in terms of generating wealth and jobs for Nigerians. The only thing we are saying is that the law should be followed. We should not encourage lawlessness “.

Responding, the CEO, Nigerdock, Maher Jarmakani, said the firm has taken notable steps in this regard as they have been granted bonded permits by the Nigerian Customs and they are currently working with Nigerian Ports Authority to ensure all processes of getting the needed approvals are followed accordingly.

“We are seeking your support Honourable Minister and that is why we wrote a letter of appeal for your guidance and your support to see that we have followed all processes and procedures” Jarmakani stated.

Furthermore, Jarmakani informed the Minister that in the 30 years of its existence, Nigerdock has employed more Nigerians than its peers, assuring that the company will not undermine the country’s extant rules and regulations.