The Federal Government has reiterated its readiness to increase the awareness and applicability of the Port Service Support Portal (PSSP), a dispute resolution platform in resolving trade-related dispute in the nation’s seaports.
PSSP is an online real-time complaint resolution platform for all players at the port, which also serves as a one-stop-shop for all complaints in the industry.
Speaking at a roundtable session on Nigerian port organised by the Maritime Anti-Corruption Network (MACN) in Abuja, Soji Apampa, CEO of the Integrity Organisation Limited, said the PSSP is a resolution mechanism built by Federal Government in 2016 to resolve conflicts and infractions of both the private and public players at the seaports.
Moses Fadipe, deputy director, Complaints Unit of the Nigerian Shippers Council (NSC), acknowledged that the portal has been running since it was declared open by the Vice President, Yemi Osinbajo in 2016.
He said that about 400 different infractions at the ports have been resolved since the PSSP was unveiled.
According to him, data generated from the portal can be used by government for policy formulation and feedback mechanism for activities and operations at the ports.
“It also goes further to tell us who does what and the highest infraction recorded per agency in the industry. PSSP will help to know the highest dispute occurrences in the ports industry, which will be aggregated and report generated for the industry,” he said.
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Citing example, he said: “We have just recorded some success where a vessel that is yet to berth had some challenges with the officials of the government, who were statutorily empowered to board the ship. While it was taking too long for the captain of the vessel to bear, he quickly registered complaint on the portal and our team responded to him immediately.”
Fadipe said the NSC in a bid to popularise the existence of the portal in 2018, took the awareness campaign to Onne, Apapa and Warri ports.
Babatunde Ruwase, chairman of Lagos Chamber of Commerce and Industry (LCCI), who expressed surprise at the existence of the dispute resolution portal, said that people have not gotten the desired attention at the ports.
According to him, “If this has been working, a lot of problems that shippers have at the nation’s seaports would not have remained unresolved as a candle cannot be light and put under the table.”
He enjoined all the government agencies working at the port to do more work by letting people know that they can lodge complaint through the portal and resolution provided within hours.
