A New Vista Opened For the Academy

Members of the House of Representatives Committee on Maritime Safety, Education and Administration visited the Maritime Academy of Nigeria last week as part of their oversight function over the Institution. In this chanced interview with Kelvin Kagbare and Christopher Eyo in Abuja, we sought to find out from the Rector what the discussions with the Lawmakers focused on  and the issues raised. After pleasantries, we asked the Rector why the NASS members are visiting the Academy twice between December 2023 and March 2024; excerpts

The members of the National Assembly who attended the last Passing Out Parade, POP represented the leadership of the National Assembly and Nigerians. As representatives of the people, they came to grace the occasion and that was just it; their coming again is part of their duty, what is known as oversight function which they have over all Ministries, Department and Agencies, MDAs, in Nigeria.

The Rector and NASS members on facility tour at the Academy recently

Their coming to the Academy is in line with performing their duties as members of the National Assembly to ensure that the MDAs under their supervision are carrying out their statutory roles as enacted.

Such visitation is something that they do regularly to be on the same page with the management of all Agencies of the Federal Government and there are many benefits to such visits.

Commodore Duja Emmanuel Effedua (rtd.), Rector, MAN

They came to find out our challenges and see how they can intervene and facilitate smooth running of the school. The visit to MAN was quite timely and their intervention on a number of issues was very refreshing and rewarding. They have encouraged and  opened a new vista for us to work within and we are elated!

The Management of the Academy and the honourables members  looked into and found solutions to some of the challenges we have at the Academy such as  funding,  runaway contractors, detractors, petition writers, our trainings, lecturers amongst others which I will speak on one after the other:

Funding

Our funding with 5% NIMASA revenue is common knowledge. I must say NIMASA has been solidly behind us but the funds have not been coming as regular we would have preferred. There are delays which are not entirely NIMASA’s making; there are administrative and procedural issues which we have discussed with members of the NASS which they have agreed to resolve soonest for the Academy to function efficiently.

We have several operational bills to pay such as contract staff who are professionals manning key positions and covering gaps which staffs lack the competence to handle. These contract staff are not labourers or quacks but core professionals that we had to woo to the Academy to get us to where we are today. If you remove them from the scheme of operations as it is set up to run in the school today, there could be issues and God forbid, we could fall back to where the Academy use to be. Getting them to come work at the Academy was not an easy task but I know I had to go for such professionals to move the Academy from where it was and make it the envy of other Maritime Academies.

How are you coping? How are you able to do the things you are doing at the Academy considering the challenges of remittances of the 5% funding arrangement by the FG?

We are limping. It is not easy. The fact that we blocked all revenue leakages and cut down drastically on operational overhead has helped us very well. We also get some income from the short courses we run, school fees and other few areas which cannot sustain us but we thank God for His mercies for where we are.

I am happy we took that decision when we did and today, this Academy is rated far above many Academies in Africa. We have put it back on the world map. The International Maritime Organization, IMO, appreciates our efforts and they have been very supportive as well.

You may not be aware; the Interim Management Committee headed by Chief Adebayo Sarumi made recommendations to the Presidency which were approved for us to do everything possible to put the Academy on the world map and make it competitive.

The need for adequate, timely funding cannot be over emphasized because, without plugging those operational gaps, there will be problems. There are many responsibilities we have to carry out. We have to train, we have to take care of the maintenance, we have to re-calibrate all the time after every training course and these things cost money, we have Cadets to cater for and numerous everyday maintenances to do.

For instance, I have over two hundred youths of the community engaged for keeping the Academy clean and making it  conducive for teaching and learning. They resume by 6am and close by 11am daily. They have their assigned portions and we provided mowers and other clearing/cleaning machines for them to work with. How would it be if such persons are not paid at the end of the month?

The Academy you see today is the result of hard decisions we had to take in order to successfully restructure and reposition the Academy as mandated by the Federal Government. If we took the old civil service route which crippled the Academy for over forty years of its existence, we will not be where we are now.

CSR initiative by the Academy

In 2019, i went for Simulators because that is the required training equipment which the global maritime community will reckon with not structures/facilities no matter how beautiful. We did not get any extra funding from anywhere; we made sacrifices and saved to meet out needs. In terms of certification and recognition we are a force on the world stage.

When I assumed duty, the decay was much, the rot horrible. The IMO was threatening to delist Nigeria from the white list and as CEO i have the responsibility to take certain decisions within the ambit of the civil service rules which i work with. All i have done is to reposition the Academy for excellence.

Projects/Structures

The NASS members came to have a firsthand experience of what the true position is concerning projects and structures in the Academy. As Rector I am not privy to what they know or what they may have been told but we always welcome them anytime-not just the law makers; anyone who wants to visit the Academy is free to do so.

As it stands today, we do not have any abandoned project at the Academy. We met thirty nine uncompleted projects at different stages. All but two have been fully resolved. These two are identified as substandard. One of them was terminated by those who awarded it because it was defective. The other one is there as it is because the building has failed all integrity tests by experts in that area; though approved to be demolished, it is still standing at the Academy. Somehow, I think the contractor got info on the decision to demolish the building and he quickly wrote to us asking for payment of over fifty million naira for job done and we wrote him telling him we will refer him to the anti graft agencies and he is waiting and watching, such persons have their informants so it’s a kind of cat and mouse game and that is why that structure is there.

The NASS members during a presentation by the Rector

The contractor is waiting for us to pull it down so that he can sue us. Wisdom is profitable and we are applying wisdom in some of these matters to avoid unnecessary encumbrances in the affairs of the Academy.  These are part of the issues we discussed with and pointed out to the Lawmakers when they visited us last week; they gave us very useful advise and we are glad they came.

The Lawmakers agreed that they will go after all those contractors who collected money for contracts at the Academy between 2009, 2012 and 2013 but failed to deliver on their contracts. So that is the situation; anybody talking about abandoned projects and probe at the Academy is either hallucinating or drowning in self delusion.

Classrooms/Hostels

Those who are familiar with the Academy, know what our classrooms and hostels were before I was appointed. We have remodeled, redesigned and recreated them all. Our classrooms are now lecture theatres. They are smart, air-conditioned and configured for online lectures. Which is why Covid19 did not affect our Cadets, we were running lectures seamlessly because we have specialists in that area- these are some of the persons referred to as contract staff because of civil service processes and procedures.

A Lecture theatre at the Academy

Our hostels are now ensuite with two Cadets to a room fitted with water heaters, wardrobes and solid beds.

Power/Electricity

Within the first few months of my assumption of duty, we embarked on powering the Academy with Solar power and as we speak, over 95% of the entire Academy is solar powered. Our offices, classrooms and street lightings etc are solar powered. It is only when we want to run heavy duty equipment that we run our generators. This has helped because the price of diesel now is out of reach. The last time I bought a truck load of diesel it was over thirty million naira. This is also one of the concerns raised by the NASS members during our discussions. They told me that my price of diesel is wrong and I was shocked at the figures they mentioned. If not for the foresight  we had of embarking on solar, how does one cope with the current high cost of diesel?

NASS member on inspection tour of the Academy

I am the one who connected staff quarters to provide light to them gratis when I assumed duty as Rector but the cost of fuel has made it unsustainable especially when you consider several other issues we have to contend with everyday.

I was amused when I learnt about someone talking about staff quarters in darkness! Which maritime Agency has powered its staff homes with electricity in Nigeria? You don’t just write for writing sake you must verify and crosscheck any info people give to you to avoid been caught in cross fires! Anyway, we are on course as we remain focused on the assignment given to me by the Federal Government.

Lecturers

At Management level we agreed to get Nigerian lecturers and we contacted the Alumni of the Maritime Academy of Nigeria, AMANO and the Nigerian Association of Master Mariners,  NAMM. Talks with AMANO are not foreclosed but the NAMM President, Captain Tajudeen Alao worked very hard and got us a master Marina who was working with an oil and gas company in the Port Harcourt area.

We were very happy when he came to assume duty and he stayed for about a week and took excuse that he was going for a burial only for him to send me a message that he had resigned. He was asking for outrageous unimaginable conditions that are not within our reach. So, what do I do? The Academy is a national Institution that must not die. I made contact with those I know within and outside Nigeria and there are bright prospects but somehow, an Indian engineer based in Scotland saw our profile online and contacted the us through email.  I took it as a joke but we got talking and as we speak he has resume work as a lecturer at the Academy!

It has been a long, tough journey; we thank the NASS members who have been very supportive and maritime stakeholders who have stood by us; supporting us with kind words and guidance along the way.

We have procured and installed top notch simulators, bought over 20 brand new buses with money saved by blocking leakages. We shall continue to strive for the best in all we do at the Academy.

The Multi-Functional Classroom Simulator

The Academy was like a jungle back then but today it has become a wide golf course. I must insist and emphasize that the Oron people are not bad people. Like every community, city  or village and other places,  there are bad elements,  deviants who are embedded among the good people of Oron. Those are the ones causing confusion by writing unfounded petitions. Our Anti graft agents are very intelligent people who know what they doing and the frivolous petition writers are surprised to be seeing me go and come all the time!

Blue Economy

The priority right now is to make sure that the Blue Economy succeeds; maritime CEOs are working with our minister who is leading and directing us on. We are working with him to explore and exploit the blue economy potentials for the benefit of all citizens. A lot is being worked on which shall be unveiled to all stakeholders in a short while.