*Create maritime intelligence unit
Vincent Toritseju
Lagos — The Nigerian Maritime Administration and Safety Agency, NIMASA, has concluded plans to work with the Presidential Amnesty Programme, PAP, in the fight against piracy and other crimes in the country’s maritime domain.
Disclosing this during a working visit to office of the Sole Administrator of PAP, Director-General of NIMASA, Dr. Bashir Jamoh, said that the collaboration will assist government in finding lasting solution to the menace of pirates attacks against vessels in the Gulf of Guinea, GoG.
Jamoh underscored the importance of collaboration among relevant agencies and communities in the quest for maritime security, saying, “We should be working together in partnership to help us appreciate and evaluate the challenges from our various perspectives and collectively come up with solutions that would work for all of us, and the country at large.
“Security problems more often than not have a local content. So, as the country’s maritime regulatory agency, we want to partner the amnesty programme, which interfaces with the littoral communities, to nip the security challenges in the bud, and stand our nation in good stead for the optimisation of our huge maritime resources.”
Jamoh has prioritized advocacy for inter-agency cooperation in the fight against maritime insecurity since his appointment last year.
He stated, “We cannot proffer solution to the issues and crisis in the Niger Delta without the collaboration of the Presidential Amnesty Programme.”
The agency boss also said that a Maritime Intelligence Unit was recently established by NIMASA to help in the identification of early warning signs in order to prevent security breaches in the littoral areas.
He revealed that many of the assets being installed and deployed under the Integrated National Security and Waterways Protection Infrastructure (the Deep Blue Project) had intelligence gathering capabilities through air, land and sea surveillance.
Jamoh stated that NIMASA was planning to introduce educational, entrepreneurship training, and skills acquisition programmes in the areas of fishing, clearing and forwarding, and legal bunkering, for people in the coastal communities as a way of empowering them and discouraging criminal tendencies.
Similarly, Sole Administrator of PAP, Col. Milland Dixon Dikio, Rtd, commended Jamoh for his vision and commitment to maritime security. He also commended the agency’s passion for inter-agency coordination and collaboration in the security of Nigeria’s maritime environment.
He said detecting the early warning signs and engaging early responses to prevent security challenges at their early stages would be vigorously pursued.
The PAP boss expressed the willingness of his agency to partner with NIMASA, especially in the empowerment of the locals. He suggested that the people’s knowledge of the local communities should be leveraged in the area of information gathering.
Dikio advised that the training programme being planned by NIMASA should target subjects relevant to the Niger Delta in order to impact them directly and get to the root of the problem. He also suggested the appointment of nodal officers from PAP and NIMASA to interface and harmonise action points to fast-track the actualisation of the partnership for the overall good of the maritime sector.
