Anti-piracy bill will combat maritime crime as sector creates 7,000 jobs

By Tope Templer Olaiya, Sulaimon Salau, Gloria Ehiaghe (Lagos) and Rotimi Agboluaje (Ibadan)

Director General of the Nigerian Maritime Administration and Safety Agency (NIMASA), Dakuku Peterside, has said the agency was taking strategic steps to deal with maritime piracy.

He disclosed that the anti-piracy bill, sponsored by NIMASA, has been passed by the National Assembly and as soon as it is signed into law, it would help tame piracy in and open up more opportunities in the sector.

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Source: guardian.ng

Nigerian piracy levels deemed ‘unacceptable’, international solutions sought

SAM CHAMBERS

Some of shipping’s top stakeholders met on Friday at the London headquarters of the International Maritime Organization (IMO) to demand action to counter the dire piracy situation off the Gulf of Guinea, which is causing severe distress for seafarers who have to transit the region.

The event, co-sponsored by BIMCO, IMCA, ICS, ITF and OCIMF, drew members of the shipping community, flag states and agencies from the Gulf of Guinea.

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Source: splash247.com

Pirates Demand $1m To Free Five Indian Sailors

The Nigerian pirates who took five Indian seafarers hostage last month have demanded $1 million to release them. They made a ransom call to one of the victim’s families in Haryana’s Jind district three days ago.

“At first I thought they said $1,000 and thought we could manage the amount and get them released. But one of the pirates repeated his demand as $1 million,” Bharat Deshwal, cousin of Ankit Hooda, one of the abducted seamen, told TOI over phone from Rohtak.

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Source: thetidenewsonline.com

Piracy: Changing a Wrong Perception of Nigeria

BY Vincent Obia

When in December last year Dr. Dakuku Peterside appealed to the International Maritime Bureau (IMB) to, “Please, report Nigeria appropriately,” he was making a passionate comment on a country determined to change, and challenging the misrepresentation of its situation by a world information system often lost in the ambiguities of perception. The call by the Director-General of the Nigerian Maritime Administration and Safety Agency (NIMASA), made during a visit by the International Maritime Security Operations Team (IMSOT) from the United Kingdom, was against the backdrop of exaggerated reports on incidents on the country’s waterways. IMB, a specialised department of the International Chamber of Commerce (ICC) dedicated to fighting maritime crime and malpractice, was the main culprit in what looked like a campaign of disinformation against the Nigerian maritime domain.

In often complicated and confusing accounts of maritime incidents, crimes within and outside Nigeria’s territorial waters are lumped together and presented as piracy. And attempts are hardly made to appreciate Nigeria’s efforts to curtail security incidents within its maritime space.

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Source: thisdaylive.com

Maritime crimes squeeze NIMASA’s revenue

by Onyedi Ojiabor

The Director-General, Nigerian Maritime Administration and Safety Agency (NIMASA), Dr. Dakuku Peterside, yesterday blamed high rate of crime for the revenue shortfall the agency recorded in 2018 fiscal year.

He spoke in Abuja during 2019 budget defence session of the agency before the Senate Committee on Marine Transport. Peterside who made the submission in response to a question on why NIMASA’s contributions to the Consolidated Revenue Fund in 2018 reduced by N6billion noted that maritime crimes was largely responsible for the reduction.

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Source: thenationonlineng.net

Oil tanker owners negotiating with abductors of five Indian sailors

The Indians were reportedly abducted on April 19 when the vessel, the Palau-registered Apecus, was anchored off Lagos in Nigeria.

The owners of an oil tanker, whose five Indian crew members were kidnapped in the waters off Nigeria last month, have established contact with the abductors and are negotiating for their release, people familiar with developments said on Tuesday.

The Indians were reportedly abducted on April 19 when the vessel, the Palau-registered Apecus, was anchored off Lagos in Nigeria. There was no official word on the current status or whereabouts of the kidnapped men.

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Source: hindustantimes.com

Kidnapped Product Tanker Crewmembers Still in Captivity

The six seafarers who were kidnapped at the Bonny Outer Anchorage last month are still missing. Five were Indian nationals, and their families are calling upon the Indian government to intervene.

At 1330 hours in the afternoon of April 19, Nigerian pirates boarded the product tanker Apecus while she lay at anchor just off the coast of Bonny Island, a well-defended oil and gas complex in the Niger River Delta. In broad daylight, the attackers abducted six seafarers and departed. The remaining crewmembers were unharmed, and they navigated their vessel to the Bonny Inner Anchorage.

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Source: maritime-executive.com

ReCAAP ISC: Alert on Incidents in Singapore Strait during January-April

By Baibhav Mishra

During January-April 2019, four incidents of unauthorised boarding of ships in locations of close proximity to each other were reported in the western sector of Singapore Strait.

All four incidents occurred to tug boats towing barges and dredger while underway in the westbound lane of the Traffic Separation Scheme (TSS). Of the four incidents, two incidents reported loss of scrap metal, and nothing was reported stolen in the other two incidents. The crew was not injured in all four incidents.

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Source: seanews.co.uk

Navy tasks NASS on anti-piracy bill

Kingston Obung

The menace of piracy in Nigeria’s territorial waters could be brought to an end if the National Assembly expedites action on the bill before it on piracy, the Nigerian Navy has said.

This remark was made in Calabar by Com Olukoya Bamidele, a guest lecturer and representative of the Nigerian Navy during an inter-agency corporation seminar organised by the Naval War College, Nigeria to discuss the Harmonized Standard Operating Procedures on Arrest, Detention and Prosecution of Vessels &Persons in Nigeria Maritime Environment (HSOP-AD&P).

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Source: blueprint.ng

Wife of ASG subleader, 3 other ‘bomb makers’ arrested

By: Julie Alipala

ZAMBOANGA CITY — The wife of a ranking leader of the Abu Sayyaf and three other terror suspects were arrested early on Wednesday and flown immediately to Manila where they were charged with illegal possession of explosives at the Department of Justice.

The four suspects are “high value targets” and deeply involved in the Abu Sayyaf’s bombing activities and other terror operations, according to Col. Tom Tuzon, chief of the Criminal Investigation and Detection Group in Western Mindanao.

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Source: newsinfo.inquirer.net