Capt. Iheanacho Ebubeogu, Chief Executive Officer, Omick Marine Ltd., on Wednesday advised that Port Health Service should certify a ship first before other government agencies could go onboard.
Ebubeogu gave the advice in a paper presentation on Obligations of Various Actors in Vessel Boarding and Rummaging Constitutional and Legal Derivatives.
The paper was presented at the Port Standing Task Team (PSTT) two-day seminar on the Implementation of the Nigerian Port Process Manual (NPPM) in Lagos on Wednesday.
The seminar had the theme, ”Global Best Practices in Port Operations and the Industry Perspective”.
According to Ebubeogu, Part II Section 3 of the Port Health Act, 2015 provides that the port health officer may, for the purposes of regulations, inspect any ship already in the port or on arrival.
He said it was the duty of government in taking care of health welfare of people, to ensure that before they interact with people of Nigeria, that port health give them a clean bill of health, together with the ship.
“If Port Health does not certify a ship and gives it a clean bill, no other person can go onboard that ship.
“Too many things happen in a ship as it goes from one country to another and so the need to ensure that the health status of the ship and crew is sound,” he said.
He pointed out that for the immigration service, they are to cross-check to ensure that none of the wanted person in the international community was on board and nobody was questionable.
“Human beings don’t only constitute potential health hazards, they can also be security as well as socio-economic threats.
“It becomes the duty of Immigration to ensure that everybody on board has his name in the crew manifest,” he said.
Responding, Comptroller Abdulkadir Garo of the Nigeria Immigration Service, Port Command said that they sought the crew contract from the ship, as it was part of their requirement to ascertain employment status of crew on board.
Garo represented by Mr Augustus Maisor, Public Relations Officer of the port command said that they ask for the contract when they are not satisfied with the information contained in the seaman’s book.
“The crew contract, the bond between the vessel owner and crew onboard specifies the employment status of each crew member.
“It includes the capacity in which they are engaged and for how long they are to work onboard the given ship,” he said.
In his contribution on charges given to ship captains, Mr Sheye Talabi, from the Port Health Service noted that presently Federal Government was working to have a uniform template for all charges.
