Nigeria Port Task Team Saves Nigeria N5.4bn From Vessel Demurrage.

The Standing Port Task Team of the Nigerian Shippers’ Council claimed it had saved the country’s economy over N5.4 billion from 2021 to 2022 as demurrages that were paid annually by ships ploughing Nigerian ports.

Speaking in the largest port (Lagos) recently at the meeting of the Presidential Port Standing Task Team (PPSTT), Mr Moses Fadipe, the national coordinator of Port Standing Task Team, said the amount represented an average of $20,000 per vessel demurrage per day.

Mr Fadipe mentioned the interventions of the Port Standing Task Team have made sure that over 85 percent of vessels that came through the country’s ports and terminals left without incident in 2021.

He ascribed the feat to the interventions of the PSTT in restoring order in the port corridors.

In his words “We have reduced incidences of extortions by both state and non-state actors and enabled free movement of vehicles and persons along the ports’ logistics ring. Also, revenue to the tone of N1,023,000 have accrued to the Federal Government Treasury Single Account through fines collected from offenders of Operation Free the Port Corridor,” he said.

He assured that the successes would be sustained with good strategies of consolidation aimed at surpassing the previous profits.

“It was discovered that stoppage of trucks along the port corridors includes the biggest disturbance to the free flow of traffic and this breeds extortion and corrupt practices,” he said.

Mr Fadipe said the Federal Ministry of Transportation had on April 14, of last year 2022, flagged off the commencement to remove all illegal checkpoints set up by hoodlums along the port corridors to eliminate traffic gridlock and corrupt practices and impediments to ease of doing business.

Mohammed Bala, a reputable truck owner, said the extortion checkpoints that were removed, had returned to the port corridors.

“Truckers are seriously bleeding due to the activities of these hoodlums. From Mile 2 down to Second Gate, these miscreants are littered there,” he said.

Mr Aloga Ogogbo, the executive secretary of the Nigerian Association of Road Transport Owners(NURTW, claimed the extortion was now taking place at odd hours.