Despite the persistent warning by the Nigerian Maritime Administration and Safety Agency (NIMASA) as well as the National Inland Waterways Authority to Commercial boat operators in the oil-rich Niger Delta on water safety, operators have continued to defile such detectives. Daily Trust investigations have revealed.
Both agencies had in the face of the different boat mishaps warned that it would sanction any commercial boat operator found to be operating without ensuring that passengers are well kitted with life jacket.
But a recent trip by our correspondent from Warri to Krurutie a distance of about 2,30 minutes by boat shows that operators do not obey NIWA’s directives as they operate without life jacket.
This recklessness is coming on the heels of a series of boat mishaps across the country, which has claimed several lives and injuring others. Some of the passengers who were on their way to see their wards schooling at the Nigerian Maritime University, Kurutie, Delta State called on relevant government agencies to ensure enforcement of the use of life jackets, noting that any mishap involving student’s of the school might affect the image of the institution.
They urged NIMASA and NIWA to de-emphasize on revenue collection and Fox use more on safety, insisting that most riverine communities depend only on water transportation to move about as they don’t have roads.
Mary Nwachukwu, who came from Lagos to witness the matriculation ceremony of her younger brother who is a student of the Nigerian Maritime University, Kurutie said that the ride from Warri waterside to the school was bumpy and very risky.
Mary, a nurse by profession said that her heart was practically in her mouth throughout the one and half hour ride from Warri to the school.
“The school is okay, the environment is cool but more attention should also be given to the mode of transportation. The operator of the boat I rode in practically told me that they don’t use life jacket” she added.
She said that the boats carry as much as 15 to 20 passengers from the different jetties in Warri without any of the passengers wearing life jackets. A boat ride from Warri to Kurutie or Okerenkoko, according to her goes for between N2000 to N2500.
A passenger who lives in Okerenkoko and works in Warri explained that life jackets are not readily available for many of the boat rides, and many of the passengers hardly ask for one.
According to the passenger who simply identified himself as Tari Tubokebima, “Here in Warri, life jackets are not what you see on passengers who use water transportation. For islands like Kurutie or Okerenkoko, access is mainly by water. Maybe because both islands are mostly habited by the Ijaws, nobody seems to ask for a life jacket during a boat ride either to or from Warri.
He said that the Ijaws are proficient in swimming so requesting for life jackets during a boat ride is viewed with scepticism. According to him, it is always an hour boat ride that can be turbulent depending on the tides of the waves.
” For people like me that work in Warri and live in Okerenkoko at times, I have had to take boat rides at night due to delay at the workplace,” he added.
The journey took exactly an hour and ten minutes and was turbulent in areas where strong waves shook the boat. Our Correspondent, out of fear had to plead with the driver of the boat to lend him the only life jacket onboard, which attracted laughter from the boat passengers
Calls to NIWA’s National Spokesman, Mr Tayo Fadile could nit be achieved as his telephone line was switched off, but he had acknowledged at an interactive session with media men in Lagos that it was practically impossible to provide life jackets to everyone using Nigeria’s inland waterways.
