Comfort Oseghale
The Nigerian Maritime Administration and Safety Agency has called for expedited action on the passage of the anti-piracy bill.
The Director-General of the agency, Dr. Dakuku Peterside, said this at a four-day workshop organised by the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime in collaboration with the United States government, which was held in Lagos recently.
The workshop, which focused on developing a robust anti-piracy bill aimed at dealing with piracy and other related maritime crimes, had in attendance Justices of the Court of Appeal and the Federal High Court, prosecutors from the Directorate of Public Prosecution of the Federal Ministry of Justice and the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission as well as some officials of the Nigerian Navy and NIMASA.
Peterside expressed the agency’s desire to work with other stakeholders and explained that the bill was necessary to provide the requisite framework for the fight, prosecution and punishment of piracy and related maritime crimes in Nigeria.
He said, “I thank you all for participating in this workshop and urge that you do a thorough job so as to ensure early passage of the bill into law when presented to the National Assembly as it will reduce the legislative input that may cause delay.
“NIMASA will collaborate with the Federal Ministry of Transportation, the Federal Ministry of Justice and all relevant stakeholders to ensure early conclusion of work on the draft bill and ultimate transmission to the National Assembly for enactment.”
Facilitators at the workshop featured members of the UNODC team, Mr. Guiseppe Sernia and Mr. Philip Drew.
It was agreed that the Federal Ministry of Justice, the Nigerian Navy and NIMASA would meet again to fine-tune the draft anti-piracy bill before sending it to the Federal Ministry of Transportation for presentation to the Federal Executive Council and ultimate transmission to the National Assembly.
The anti-piracy bill, which is an initiative of NIMASA, was conceived to incorporate the safety of lives at sea and the suppression of unlawful acts at sea conventions of the International Maritime Organisation into a comprehensive legislation to deal with the menace of piracy and related crimes in the Nigerian maritime domain.
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