The Ministers of Blue Economy, Gboyega Oyetola and Saidu Alkali his transportation counterpart, were invited to the National Assembly by the House of Representatives for allegedly being involved in fraudulent concession of some ports infrastructure.
The Managing Director, Nigeria Ports Authority, Mohammed Bello Koko, Mamman Ahmadu, the Director-General of the Bureau of Public Enterprise, as well as the Director-General of the Infrastructure Concession Regulatory Commission, Michael Ohiani, among other was also called in for questioning.
On Tuesday, the Chairman of the House Committee on Privatisation and Commercialisation, Ibrahim Hamish had issued the invitation in a meeting with the seaport terminal operators in Abuja.
The lawmaker lamented over the absence of the top government officials to defend their roles in the concession of the seaport terminals.
The committee members showed their dissatisfaction at the alleged shady manner the concession process was managed which permitted five companies to fully operate for five years without renewal, thereby, yielding a great loss of revenue to the Federal Government.
He said, “They (ministers) must appear before the committee on March 12. We also want to assure that this committee would work very hard to make sure that this issue is over and to do that, you are to furnish the Committee with all the relevant documents through the Secretariat by Friday.”
He urged the ports stakeholders that they were invited to the meeting to “discuss how best to address this prolonged renewal process because of the need to attract investments into our critical port infrastructure which is one of the major focuses of this administration.
He said, “From the brief we received from affected parties and the Ministries, Departments and Agencies involved in the process.
“We understand that as of today, what is outstanding in concluding the process that started over five years ago is the execution of the negotiated supplementary agreements for the respective terminals.”
At the end of the meeting, Hamisu addesesd the Journalists present, and assertained that there was a need to unravel why companies listed were still operating without renewal of the concession agreement.
“Some seaport terminals were given out on concession and five of them have expired. Some are from Lagos and some are from Port Harcourt. They were trying to see that their approvals were renewed in 2021.
“Somehow, this renewal was not granted to them, but they have been operating since then. So we deemed it fit to cross check and find out what the problem is.
“We decided to invite them, and all the stakeholders like the Ministry of Blue Economy, ICRC, BPP, and the Ministry of Transportation. After inviting them here today, unfortunately only the seaport terminal operators are here.
“We have discussed with them and they have one week within which the Minister of Blue Economy, MD NPA, BPP and ICRC should appear before this committee.
“They are to appear on March 12 by 10 AM so that we can discuss with them, see where the problem is and take action so that we can bring a lasting solution to the problem.
“The names of the affected seaport terminals are Port and Cargo Terminal, ENL Consortium Terminal C, ENL Consortium Terminal D, Josepdam Terminal and AMS Terminal.
“There are the five terminals whose concession period has expired and they have been operating illegally from 2021 to date and we want to investigate and see what the problem is and whoever is in charge of this, we will deal with him”, he warned.
