The President-General of Maritime Workers Union of Nigeria, Adewale Adeyanju, has said that stagnated terminal charges by port concessionaires affect the welfare of dockworkers.
Adeyanju, in a chat with newsmen in Lagos, also registered the union’s support for the upward review of terminal operators handling charges, which had been stagnant since the concessioning of the ports.
“We call on the Federal Government through the Nigerian Ports Authority, Nigerian Shippers’ Council, Ministry of Transportation, Bureau for Public Enterprise etc, to consider increasing tariffs due to terminal operators.
“We believe doing this will boost their financial capacity to fulfil their obligations to our members and government,” he said.
He blamed the growing insecurity at Nigerian ports on nonchalance of the Federal Government towards activities of multinational companies doing business at the ports.
According to him, most of the multinational companies have outsourced security functions of their organisations to foreign nationals such as South Africa, America, Togo and Uganda, to the detriment of indigenous firms with the same experience and expertise.
“I, therefore, use this opportunity to call on all relevant security agencies to rise up to their jobs before we are overrun by insecurity in our ports,” he added.
Calling on the Nigerian Maritime Administration and Safety Agency to expedite action on the re-issuance of biometric identity cards to Nigerian dockworkers, he said the ones in their possession had since expired.
