NIMASA Threatens To Sanction Manning Agents Over Non Remittance Of Check Off Dues To Unions
The Nigerian Maritime Administration and Safety Agency (NIMASA) has threatened to sanction manning agents that refuses to remit check off dues to the two seafarering unions in the country.
The Director General of NIMASA, Dr. Bashir Jamoh issued the threat warning on Tuesday , at the official commissioning of the new secretariat of the Nigeria Merchant Navy Officers and Water Transport Senior Staff Association (NMNOWTSSA) in Lagos.
Jamoh who was represented at the occasion by Captain Kennedy Fiemotongha, said that the Director General of the apex maritime agency was doing his best to leave the agency better than he met it.
While commending the efforts of the executives and members of the union for the acquisition of a befitting secretariat especially during the pandemic, the DG added that the agency was working hard to see that the welfare of Nigerian seafarers significantly improve.
He said, “I am proud of this achievement because it is the pride of all mariners and I want the work to keep going.
“I appreciate the efforts of all members and stakeholders for making this day a reality
On the challenges of non remittance of check off dues to the union, the NIMASA boss called on the leadership of the union to tender such matter before the agency for appropriate action against such manning agencies, even as he stated that some manning agents were not registered by NIMASA, thus operate illegally.
“To crown it all,NIMASA has tried its best in terms of security and it’s still trying and in case of any challenge be free to approach him
“Like the challenge of where manning agents are not remitting check off dues, this I think can be addressed if they are put in the right forum
“If anyone is found wanting because most of the manning agents are not approved by NIMASA, that’s why you should bring your complaints to NIMASA,” he submitted.
On his part, Maritime Security Consultant, Rear Admiral Godwill Ombo (rtd) stressed the need for training and retraining of seafarers’ for the benefit of competing with their foreign counterpart.
“We must continually train and retrain the upcoming generation of seafarers.
There must be a home that is managing the human resources management aspect of the merchant navy.
Also speaking , Africa Regional Secretary, International Transport Workers Federation (ITF), Muhammed Dauda Safiyanu, in his remarks said
“Seafarers are facing very big problems. We have piracy in our approach to make sure that some of them are addressed.
He added that”The ones we have here in Nigeria, we are now concentrating on how do we actually increase the ITF agreement.
According to him, “This agreement tends to actually take care of their welfare and their safety and that is what one of things we are working towards to make sure that we have a robust data with NIMASA, the ship owners and the ship managers so that we can increase the number of ITF agreement that we have in Nigeria.
“Secondly, we also have challenges that had to do with the lack of international certificate of seafarers, because most of the Nigerian seafarers are actually working assiduously to be part of the trade, but their certification does not give them that power to go into international arena, so we want see how best we can have a robust discuss with NIMASA and the ship owners and Ship managers so that there will be a kind of an international certification that will give Nigerians the benefit of being in the international arena.
“These are one of the things we are looking at under what we call the “Maritime Support Affiliate Project”, that is going to run for about 15 months in Nigeria and we have actually contacted stakeholders to ensure that this project succeeds.
” It has actually taken off last week. We made some technical committee meeting that will bring about the roadmap for us to actually achieve this good objectives based on the Maritime Affiliate support under the International Transport Workers Federation.”he added.
By Roland Ekama
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