Shippers’ Council Seeks Regulator For Transport Sector

A transport sector without a commercial regulator as we currently have in Nigeria is dangerous for the economy, the Executive Secretary and Managing Director, Nigeria Shippers’ Council, Mr Hassan Bello has said.


Bello said this while receiving a delegation of top officials from LEADERSHIP Newspapers Group, Lagos Office, led by the Director of Operations, Mr Ademola Oladosun, at the NSC Headquarters, Apapa, Lagos.

Confirming that the port concession to private terminal operators had brought about 50 per cent efficiency in the country’s international trade system, the NSC boss however noted that the problem of arbitrary charges was dominant in the system.

He however said the Council had been able to reduce seaport charges for importers from about 13 to seven, adding that the NSC needed the legal backing to take full responsibility of regulating commercial matters in the country’s transport sector generally.

“Virtually all sectors in our economy has a regulator. We have the Nigeria Communication Commission (NCC) that regulates telecommunication, there is NAICOM for insurance and the CBN for banks. However, in transport sector, this is missing and the trend is extremely dangerous. Stakeholders have recommended that there be a regulator in transport. NSC has been carrying out certain regulatory role, but needs the legal backing to do this fully,” Bello said.

An expert in Carriage Regime, Bello further noted that the future of Nigeria’s economy remained very bright if government remained consistent with ongoing development of the transport system, including the railway.

“In all sectors, the federal government is on the path to economic stability. Things are happening in the various sectors, with a lot of economic revival, government should be consistent with its development of the transport system because that is the mirror that reflects the seriousness or otherwise, of a country,” Bello noted.

Updating the LEADERSHIP delegates on the Council’s recent attempt to have the Niger Republic import and export market back to Nigerian ports, in which the country expects to be receiving three million metric tonnes of cargoes destined to Niger annually, the NSC MD also made a case for development of inland ports and dry ports which he said are catalysts for spicing up the nation’s economy.

Earlier, the Director of Operations, LEADERSHIP Group, Mr Ademola Oladosun intimated the NSC boss of the innovations at the newspaper company, including its recent introduction of the Friday Tittle, which is first and only in Nigeria and the LEADERSHIP Hausa, which is the most read vernacular newspaper in the country.