Seafarers Board Wants Navy to Arrest Shipowners Over 20 Imprisoned Sailors

By ZION Olalekan |

The National Seafarers Welfare Board has called on the Nigerian Navy to investigate and arrest owners and charterers of vessels arrested during illegal activities on Nigerian waters rather than just arresting the seafarers alone.

Chairman of the board, Otunba Kunle Folarin made the call yesterday while addressing journalists in Apapa Lagos.

Folarin argued that the seafarer is an employee of the shipowner, hence cannot be held accountable for any infringement or infraction by the owner of the ship or the charterer.

According to him, the National Seafarers Welfare Board is working with other international organizations using diplomatic ways; it also recently secured release of five (5) seafarers who have been flown back to their country.

Apart from these, he said Twenty (20) seafarers are still in Ikoyi prison and possibly other prisons across the country. He narrated that the seafarers are there in prison because the ship they were working on was arrested by the Navy for carrying illegal crude oil.

“The shipowners are not known in most cases because most of the vessels were chattered for a single voyage, and the sailors don’t know where they are going, even when they know, they don’t know how legal what they are going to do is.

“The first person to hold accountable is the charterer or the owner of the ship, most cases when it comes to intercepting the vessel, the charterer becomes a ghost, up till now, I don’t think they have found any owner of these ships that have been arrested. The issue is clearly criminalisation of seafarers, arresting the workers as an accomplice.

“Until the government agency which is the Navy is able to police and create a good surveillance of internal and external territorial waters of Nigeria to ensure that there is a deterrent to people coming to carry crude oil.

“The embassies are aware of this; they have made efforts to engage the government in discussion to ensure their release. Most of the victims are from developing countries”

Folarin confirmed that the Nigerian Seafarers Welfare Board has been supplying items to the seafarers in prison, while others are receiving assistance from their various embassies.

The Welfare board chairman also informed that the issue of criminalisation and incarceration of seafarers in Nigeria has received the attention of international organizations, including the International Transport Federation (ITF) among others.

“When I was in Copenhagen last year, this issue was on the forefront. I tried to play down the issue because I don’t want to embarrass my country outside; it has however been constant with other issues of piracy, armed robbery at sea, stealing of crude oil, issue of non-compliance with maritime regulations. The nationality of those arrested goes across diverse climes of the world; Philippines, Indians, Ghanaians and many Nigerians.

“The shipping agents in most cases also disappear. Three weeks ago we assisted in the repatriation of some seafarers who have been abandoned by their owners, they were not imprisoned but they were abandoned at the hotel,” he said.

Meanwhile, the National Seafarers Welfare Board (NSWB) has lamented that the 12,000 seafarers registered with the Nigerian Maritime Administration and Safety Agency did not reflect in job placement.

Otunba Kunle Folarin, the chairman of the board who said this at a forum in Lagos, Tuesday, called on the federal government to put in place a veritable policy that would engage indigenous seafarers on board vessels trading in the nation’s territorial waters.

Folarin also tasked Nigerian seamen to eschew fake certification even as he averred that 5,470 vessels call at Nigerian ports without a single Nigerian seafarer working on board the vessels.

He however called on the federal government to ensure that manning of vessels trading in the nation’s territorial waters must be 100% Nigerians.

In line with the Cabotage Act, the board chairman reiterated that the role of seafarers in shipping cannot be overemphasized in the country, adding that 70% of seafarers trading on Nigerians waters are foreigners.

According to him, Nigeria has spent about $1.5billion to support importation but the value of trade has failed to reflect on seafarers and indigenous ship owners.

NSWB boss who also doubles as the Chairman Port Consultative Council (PCC) stressed that the maritime wealth of Nigeria has what it takes to engage large number of seafarers saying that the sector has everything in place to propel the economy of Nigeria.

He lamented that manning agents operating in Nigeria employ foreign crews to work aboard vessels trading in nation’s waters and the regulatory agency failed to correct the anomalies.

He called on the indigenous ship owners to desist from depending on government for support ,and map out a strategy to promote shipping in the country.

He argued that piracy, illegal bickering, oil theft and non-compliant by crew were some of the reasons seafarers remain in custody, pointing out that such illegality was not peculiar to Nigerian seafarers.