NPA to levy barge operators

22 May NPA to levy barge operators

The Nigerian Port Authority says barge operators have operated on free tickets for so long and need to start paying tariffs.

Speaking in Lagos, the Managing Director, NPA, Mohammed Bello Koko, said that barge operations in the country would soon be concessioned, threatening to crack down on illegal operators.

Explaining further, he said that concessioning of the barge operations in the country would allow the government to generate revenue.

Koko, who decried the impact of some of the illegal barge operators, said the authority had come up with a standard operating procedure that would serve as minimum safety standards for the barges.

The NPA MD noted that many of the barges operating in the country had no communication systems, stressing that some of them were not even branded.

The situation, he said, made it difficult to arrest offenders when they committed crimes.

“We are encouraging the use of barges. We have come up with an SOP for barge operations because we have all types of sizes and shapes of barges that are not safe.

“The same way we have created minimum safety standards for trucks, we have also created them for barges. They have been operating on free tickets for a long, but that has to stop.”