…Rail line to Lagos, others our selling point, game changer – Dala Inland MD

By Bashir Bello

The Executive Secretary and Chief Executive Officer of Nigerian Shippers’ Council, Pius Ukeyima Akutah has called on stakeholders in the North West zone to take full utilization of the inland dry ports in the region to export their goods and ease congestion at sea port.

Akutah made the call during a familiarization and stakeholders engagement with shippers in the North West zone held in Kano.

He said with the inland dry ports located within the region and that designated as origin and destination, the stakeholders don’t have to go to sea ports before they could export their products.

The NSC boss said the councils is all out to bring shipping services closer to the shippers in the hinterland in order to improve the service delivery and grow the trade and commerce businesses in the country.

According to him, “the Nigerian Shippers’ Council is saddled with the responsibility of promoting and developing the inland dry ports. One of our foremost inland is the Dala Inland Dry port located here in the city of Kano. Today, I also had the opportunity of visiting that inland dry port. What inland dry ports means to shippers is that it is our own efforts to bring in shipping facilities closer to shippers in the hinterland.

“You have Dala Inland Dry port, Kaduna Inland Dry port and Funtua Inland Dry port. These three inland dry ports happened to be within the North West and are the three that are operating right now. I want to encourage you to take advantage of these Inland Dry ports. They are designated as ports for origin and destination. What that means is that as a shipper you do not have any business going all the way to the sea port before you can export your products, you can export your products from these inland dry ports. And that is the whole idea of bringing shipping services closer to shippers in the interland. Our target also is that these ports will be available for even neighbouring countries to do businesses.

“The opportunities are there for us to develop this critical national infrastructure for transport services to support the trade and commerce business in this part of the country. We are working tirelessly with the state governments to see how we can develop this to support your businesses.

“This government is promoting export over import, because we want to flood the world with Nigeria forex, especially now that we are under Africa free continental trade agreement. We need to encourage our businessmen who are producing in this country to know that their products would be carried to the whole Africa for the purpose of promoting trade activities.

“Kano State has been known for export and import and commercial activities for a very long time. It has always been a route for commerce and trade, not only within Nigeria or northern nigeria but neighbouring countries. So the establishment of this critical infrastructure here shows that Nigeria is looking towards enhancing trade activities between Nigeria and other countries.

“Today, I am here to familiarize myself with the shippers. So that we can talk to ourselves to see how we improve service delivery to you. At the shippers council, we value our stakeholders more than anything because our stakeholders are the reason why we were set up,” Akutah added.

In her welcome address, the NSC Director in Northwest Zone, Karimatu Othman, said through the purposeful leadership, the council has improved relationship with stakeholders, improved efficiency in port operations, reduced unnecessary delays faced by shippers in the ports, decrease in unwholesome practices by some stakeholders in our ports and recovery of over N6 Billion for individual and corporate shippers.

Othman commended the NSC Executive Secretary for improving staff welfare, refocused the council in discharging its mandates effectively.

Earlier, while receiving the NSC Executive Secretary, Akutah, during a familiarization visit to the Dala Inland Dry port, the Managing Director of the port, Ahmad Rabiu boasted that the rail line linking the port to Lagos among other is it selling point and also a game changer.

He however, said since the port commenced operation, it is faced with some challenges such as not getting a fully established custom command and also transfer of cargo to operate effectively in the facility.

Responding, the Executive Secretary, Akutah assured the management that the council will do everything possible to address all the constraints to ensure the port operates as a full fledged inland dry port and not a terminal bound.