NIWA’ll sanitise nation’s waterways, says Moghalu

Managing Director of Nigerian Inland Waterways Authority (NIWA), Dr. George Moghalu, says his main focus as the new helmsman of the agency is not only to make water transportation the transport means of choice, but also to bring sanity to the nation’s waterways.
Speaking at meeting with stakeholders in Lagos State, on Friday, Moghalu said of the over 10,000 km of the nation’s waterways, only about 3,000km were navigable at the moment. He maintained that his aimwasa to ensure that those navigable parts of the waterways were put to optimal use.
Said he, “We must make the river ports to start to work. We must complete ongoing jetty projects and build new ones, and we must ensure safety of our waterways, in terms of both security and safety”, Moghalu said.
He said top on his agenda is to collaborate with relevant security agencies to check the activities of pirates and other undesirable elements along the nation’s waterways and to also embark on maintenance and dredging of the rivers, clearing of debris, wreckage and water hyacinths as well as training of riders, among others.
The NIWA boss also said that the agency has already signed a Memorandum of Understanding with an American firm for the provision of life jackets and other safety devices for maritime commuters.
According to Moghalu, “NIWA is set to get more serious with its regulatory functions and will criminalise the practice of not only operating with rickety watercraft, but also operating without the relevant navigational aids, especially for the boats that operate in the night and early hours of the morning.”
The NIWA boss also used the opportunity of the stakeholders meeting, put together by Engr. Sarat Braimah, Area Manager, Lagos NIWA office, and her team, to outlay his vision for NIWA.
The event was extended by shipowners, shippers, dredgers, boat operator, leaders of maritime workers union, the shipping community, traditional rulers, captains of industry, sailors, seafarers, past and present NIWA operatives, as well as the media (details later)