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- Petition Buhari, NIMASA
THE Escravos Marine Pilots have raised a save our soul alarm over the damaged breakwaters in the Escravos channel leading to the Warri port.
They have petitioned the Nigerian Ports Authority, (NPA) and the Nigerian Maritime Administration and Safety Agency, (NIMASA) to come their aid urgently.
The collapsed breakwaters, according to the pilots have drastically affected the vessels traffic in the Warri port area.
A breakwater is the sea gate to a port, built to prevent sand from entering the dredged channel.
The marine pilots in their petition to President Muhammadu Buhari, complained that despite several letters to the relevant authorities with a view to rehabilitating the channel facility, nothing has been done. This has consequently led to the Warri port recording poor ship operations.
The pilots described the damaged breakwaters as a hydrographical and technical error which has led to the facility been submerged thereby impacting negatively the operations of multi-national firms in that axis.
According to the pilots, if the breakwaters were rehabilitated, the Nigerian economy will receive a boost as ships coming the Ekpan refinery, Delta Steel Company, Flourmills and Julius Berger construction firms will have easy access to the port.
To them, “rebuilding, rehabilitating the Escravos Submerged Breakwaters will boost, and contribute to the Nigerian economy as more ships will come into the port with more tonnage of cargoes”.
They suggested that the length of the mole at sea for the proposed re-construction of the breakwaters should not be less than 0.5miles, while the length of the main mole from sea to inshore should be 3.1miles.
The also want the length of the shore protection along the shorelines to be increased to 4.5 miles.
Officials of the Nigerian Ports Authority approached for comments kept sealed lips but a source that spoke anonymously hinted that the cost of the re-construction of the Esravos breakwaters was included in the 2017 budget.
The process of finding out why the breakwaters collapsed took time and hence the delay. Apart from that test designed to fortify the one that will be constructed also took time, hence the delay in budgeting for the rehabilitation of the breakwaters.