Obadan: AMES’ President Reveals Sea Time Practical Model for Nigeria’s Cadets
By Ovie Edomi
Engr. Israel Obadan, current President of Association of Marine Engineers and Surveyors, AMES has called on the federal government to urgently address the existing gap in the sea training needs of Nigeria’s merchant Navy cadets by engaging shipping companies particularly those involved in cargo supplies to the Dangote refinery. According to Engr Obadan this training partnership programme can be accompanied with some contract incentives. He insisted that such partnership programme was how Nigeria started to develop her indigenous maritime man power when ships belonging to Elder Dempster,Palm line shipping companies took in Nigerian cadets in the 60s and early 70s, under a training program negotiated by the federal government and the shipping companies. He insisted that the cadets then were trained together with British cadets on same ships.
According to him “that was how the National Shipping Line also started to grow her fleet and shipping man power as we know it today”. Furthermore he averred that the example of NNPC is also a reference case of training partnership. “All NNPC’s cadets were trained on ships belonging to the IOCs as we call them today.Such training programmes were designed by Nigerians who had the foresight to think out of the box,not the arm chair critics who think less of themselves even before our training proposal gets to its target recipients”. Obadan noted
With respect to those who are against the training proposal, the AMES president said ” contrary to claims that the proposal be ignored, there is what is known as Mutual Flag endorsement of certificates. So critics of this new cadets training proposal, ought to learn about the Mutual Flag endorsement of certificates regulation. Moreover, Engr Obadan stated that critics of the proposal talked about cadets and officers as if it’s not a cadet that becomes an officer. In his words “You don’t become an officer before cadet. Our emphasis is more of cadets training with global focus that can hold their own on maritime matters anywhere in the world. Local players also have their own place in the maritime space and that demarcation has always been there. Every shipping company knows that a cadet is treated as a trainee even before engagement on board.But,he develops to become an officer. He should not be denied such prospects” . Obadan insisted.
Similarly, the AMES president revealed that about
996 shipping movements are involved in the operations of Dangote refinery alone. He insisted that assuming about 30% of the crude oil lifting are involved in cabotage trade, about 56 ships per annum are able to freely absorb about 2 cadets per ship it means that about 116 to 120 cadets will be absorbed in one year for the crude oil cabotage tankers.
For the refined products tankers,assuming about 30% are involved in cabotage trade and with about 276 ships available for cabotage trade, assuming they absolve two cadets per ship,about 552cadets will be absorbed on the product tankers annually. Hence the total numbers of cadets that will be absorbed by Dangote associated ships will be 120 cadets plus another 552 cadets bringing the total to 672 cadets that will be absorbed by the cabotage vessels alone.
Under the training programme, Engr Obadan insisted that the government should be responsible for the cadets salary and logistic movements.Accodingly he averred that what is required is the provision of accommodation for the cadets on board. Also, Engr Obadan said
under the Cabotage act of 2003,vessels transport crude and refined products from the oil fields or FPSO in and out of the Dangote refinery Under this act, shall be manned by Nigerians, owned by Nigerians, registered in Nigerian or trade under joint venture agreement. All vessels engaged in trade with Nigerian refineries including Dangote’s are all subjected to the act. This automatically subjects them to the act.
Also, under the Nigerian Petroleum Industry Act(PIA),there is a mandatory legal provision for IOCs and other crude oil producers to allocate crude oil for refining to local refineries including Dangote Refinery before export.This is under the Domestic Crude Supply Obligation law. The cargoes shall and are being transported to Dangote refinery under the cabotage act loaded on ships of Aframax or Suezmax sizes.Any ship offliading from the production fields to local refinery is subject to cabotage laws, Obadan opined. Furthermore, the AMES president noted that the ships can conveniently be made to comply with the cabotage regulations but with logical adjustments to accommodate a negotiated training programme. Some incentives can be given to these crude oil and refined product traders to provide training berth to our cadets on their vessels.”
NNPCL according to Obadan had similar training arrangement for its’ cadets years back same with NLNG.Although NLNG, utilises her own cadets and such doesn’t suffer sea training deficit. While thanking Alhaji Aliko Dangote for the massive investment in the Dangote refinery, one of the biggest globally, Engr Obadan emphasized that as part of the call to nation building, the federal government through the federal ministry of marine and blue economy should partner with Dangote refinery to convince the local crude oil suppliers along with some of the foreign crude oil carrier to strike a cadetship training programme with them. This he said will address the gap already existing in providing mandatory sea-time training for merchant Navy cadets being churned out from the various maritime training institutions according to IMO regulations.
Also, Engr Abuja Kato, the Secretary of the Association Marine Engineers and Surveyors corroborated the position of his President and noted that there has been a huge gap in the human capacity development between the era of National Shipping Line and now as a result Engr Kato insisted that since every person in the sea trade profession wants to get to the peak, the federal government through the federal ministry of marine and blue economy should develop both the maritime infrastructure and the human capacity side by side especially as Nigeria remains a maritime country with vital roles to play in West and Central Africa