By Stephen Ubanna
When Osagie Ehnaire, minister of Health said government attention would be focused on the seaports , airports and land borders which are the country’s major entry points in order to contain the spread of the Asian country of China Originated Coronavirus which have ravaged differrent parts of the world, not many took him serious.
This is because they knew the government would eventually shift the attention to the Nigerian Ports Authority, NPA, which oversees the nations ports to handle while the Federal Airport Authority of Nigeria, FAAN , Nigerian Immigration Services, NIS, and Port Quarantine , would be made to take charge of scrutinising the movement of travellers in and out of the international airports across the country and their Crew members to ensure that the sickness was .not exported to Nigeria.
Indeed, the confirmation that an Italian who has contacted the Coronavirus has found his way into Nigeria through the Murtala Muhammed International Airport, MMIA, after diagnosis, may have toughened the officials of NPA, to take a closer look on the foreign vessels calling at the nation’s ports and their crew as . Already, it opened the eye of officials of FAAN, NIS and Port Quarantine at the airports to beam their searchlight on the International Flights landing at the ,nation’s International airports located in different parts of the country to know the state f their health.
Hajia Hadiza Bala Usman, Managing Director, NPA, may have left no one in doubt that the Campaign to make Nigeria a Coronavirus- free country is a serious one that must be won. Given that the sickness had originated from Wuhan, in the Hebei Province of China, which remain concentrated in the Province, but had spread to South Korea, Italy and iran, may given the port officials , the power to monitor vessels sailing to Nigeria with cargo from these countries and other parts of the world.
Part of the Health security measures that was said to have been initiated by the Hajia Usman led NPA Management was the mass provision of face masks and sanitisers for port Staff including the Dockworkers.
Between December, last year and now, The Value News learnt that the port of Tangshan which is an official deep seaport on the coast of Tangshan Municipality in Hebei Province, Northern China, appear to have been abandoned by Major world shipping lines. This is evident as Containers loaded with export manufactured goods including steal products, littered the port. To forestall further production of export goods, many factories were said t have been shut down in the Province.
The situation may have been made worse as some top global Shipping Lines which were scared of taking their Container vessel to the Province to freight cargoes because of the attitude of some f the Asian country trading partners towards vessels sailing from the Coronavirus infested country to their own country to discharge cargoes.
Take for instance, AERSKKb Shipping Line, popular, Maersk, a major shipping Line that discharges cargoes from China APM Terminal in Nigerian premier port, Apapa, MSC, CMA and CGM lines were said to have reduced calls to China, described as blank sailing by manufacturing Companies in recent months. It is on records that regular schedules of ships to the ports of China, particular, the port at the Hebei Province has been most affected as port workers are stuck at home or kept away from their places of work to avoid contacting the sickness that have killed thousands of people in the Province alone.
Note the the warehouses around the ports in China are still operational. This is because the export factories had not closed shop. It is not surprising why China scheduled cargo vessels were said to have been diverted in the last two months from China to South Korea. This may have informed why the dreaded sickness spread to the country and the resolve by other maritime nations including Nigeria to protect their parts..
The fallout of the cargo divertions to South Korea had been the spillover with Container Capacity as the country’s Busan port, described as one of the world’s major Container terminals is currently witnessing a spillover with Container Capacity at 78 percent. Already, there are fears in maritime circles the South Korea Port cargo handling Capacity might rise further going by the warning of the World Health Organisation, WHO, that the sickness has become epidemic.
More so, more tonnage of Container ships are said to be idling away around the world now than during the global financial crisis, going by the recent report of Alphaliner data service. Charter tankers and Bulk cargo vessels were said to have dropped in the last two months in China.
Worried by the down n the China’s economy as a result of the Coronavirus epidemic, the Chinese government appear determined to jump start the economy to encourage shipping Lines and cargo flights to resume normal operation in the country.
China has some of the world’s biggest and newest seaports and airports but using them has become a harder because of road blocks , Quarantines and factory closings. The fear in both official and unofficial circles is that the Coronavirus, epidemic , might eat into the N2 trillion revenue target set by the government for the Nigerian Customs Service, NCS, for this fiscal year. But one person who do not believe that the virus would have any adverse effect on the volume of Containers being shipped from China to Nigeria is Abdullahi Musa, Comptroller, Tin Can Island Command. He is optimistic that the Command would still maintain its high revenue generation with improved Container ships from China calling at the Lagos port from China and other parts of the world notwithstanding the Coronavirus epidemic.
