Halt Payment Of $700m Cabotage Vessel Fund, Reps Tell NIMASA

The House of Representatives has directed the Nigerian Maritime Administration and Safety Agency (NIMASA) to stop the planned disbursement of $700 million Cabotage Vessel Fund.

The House also urged NIMASA to within seven days submit an audited statement of account detailing all the monies that have accrued to Cabotage Vessel Finance.

It summoned the minister of transportation, Mu’azu Jaji Sambo and the director-general of NIMASA, Bashir Jamoh, to appear before its committee on local content to explain the state of the Cabotage Vessel Finance Fund and how the funds have been applied in the past 20 years.

The lawmakers also mandated the committee to probe the Cabotage Vessel Finance Fund to determine all monies that have accrued to it since its establishment in 2003.

The committee, which is expected to report back to the House within 14 days, was also mandated engage an external auditor to audit all contracts in the cabotage regime and report back to the parliament.

This followed the adoption of a motion by Hon. Henry Nwawuba, on “urgent need to stop the planned disbursement of $700m Cabotage Vessel Finance Fund and investigate the total accrual of the fund, at plenary held within the week.

Nwawuba, in his motion, told the House that “ the Cabotage Vessel Finance Fund was established by the Coastal and Inland Shipping (Cabotage) Act, 2003 to promote the development of indigenous ship acquisition capacity by providing financial assistance to Nigerian operators in the domestic coastal shipping.”

The lawmaker explained that apart from monies allocated to the fund by the extant law, the fund draws from two percent (2%) of all contract sum performed by any vessel engaged in the coastal trade, and all monies generated pursuant to the Coastal and Inland Shipping (Cabotage) Act, 2003.

However, he expressed concern that since the establishment of the Cabotage Vessel Finance Fund, there is no reliable data as to the total amount that has so far accrued to the Fund.

Nwawuba added that “there is no certainty as to the actual worth of the fund at the moment.”