Hassan Bello condemns unhealthy rivalry among maritime agencies.

As the Executive Secretary and Chief Executive Officer of the Nigerian Shippers’ Council, Barrister Hassan Bello, bowed out of service after eight years of meritorious service on Friday, he has tasked heads of maritime agencies to avoid cosmetic cooperation and come together for the development of the industry.

Bello had served as the ES/CEO of the Council for eight years, having been appointed by the Goodluck Jonathan administration in 2013.

Before his appointment, he was the Director, Legal Services of the NSC.

In his speech at the sent forth event held in his honour, Bello reiterated the need for all the agencies to avoid calling superiority over one another ,saying it has done the industry more harm than good.

He maintained that some agencies would not mind to spend so much in defending its territory while neglecting its statutory mandates.

He said, “There is lack of synergy among the agencies and I don’t think it is succeeding because it has been  the basis of equality. There is no agency that is better than the other.

“Agencies are not graded by their budgets but what they contribute, but it is very unfortunate some agencies think that maritime starts and stops with them. No, it cannot work.

“Some agencies are trying to defend territories and in doing so, they go to a large extent and that is not good. They spend a lot of money to defend these territories while they neglect what they are established to do and that’s why we are not developing and that’s what Nigerian Shippers’ Council will never take from anybody not now, tomorrow or forever. We are all equal, we all have contributions to make.

“We can’t be having cosmetic cooperations, we have to have real cooperation”

“We must have digitisation of our ports otherwise, we are joking. We have to export because that is another visa of trade facilitation. We are working with the Nigeria Customs Service and the Central Bank of Nigeria”

Earlier, Bello said that the Transportation Ministry had undergone a lot of transformations, saying the era of state capture was over.

He lauded the Minister, Permanent Secretary and Directors of the Ministry for giving the Council opportunity to achieve a lot through their supports.

“The Federal Ministry of Transportation has undergone a lot of transformations and it is very rewarding to see that state capture has been broken by no other person than the Minister of Transportation”

“The Nigerian Shippers’ Council wouldn’t have been anywhere without the support of the Federal Ministry of Transportation, talking of the Minister, the Permanent Secretary and  the Directors in the Ministry”, Bello declared.