Congestion at terminals within Tin-Can Island Port in Lagos is worsening as laden ships continue to line up on the anchorage without space in the terminal to discharge laden containers.
Tin-Can Island Port harbours five terminals including Tin-Can Island Container Terminal Limited, Josepdam Port Services, Five Star Logistics Limited, Ports and Terminals Multiservices, and Ports and Cargo Handling Services.
The long waiting time for ships before berthing at Tin-Can Port has compelled international shipping lines to charge higher to freight containers, while many liners have started diverting Nigerian-bound cargoes to neighbouring ports in Cotonou and Ivory Coast.
In the first half of this year, for instance, it cost $2,500-$2,800 to ship a 20-foot container to Nigeria from China, but liners now charge $3,000-$3,360 for the same service, an increase of 20 percent, while a 40-foot container which formerly cost $3,000-$3,500 to ship has also gone up by 20 percent to $3,600-$4,200, an industry operator who does not want to be quoted told BusinessDay.
Port users blame this on endless gridlock on the roads leading to Tin-Can, Nigeria’s second largest seaport, caused by bad road and multiple checkpoints for illegal collection of funds by security operatives in charge of managing truck movement.
As a result, haulage of laden containers and delivery of empties are crippled as truckers queue on the road for weeks before having access in and out of the port, leading to high occupancy rate within the terminal. Cargo owners are now forced to pay dearly to hire trucks to move their goods out of Tin-Can Port as truckers charge higher haulage fee to recover for the delay on the road.
BusinessDay’s visit to Tin-Can Island Port showed long queues of trucks waiting to have access into the port. One queue stretched from the Second Gate through Liverpool Bridge all through to Creek Road, while another queue stretched down Liverpool Roundabout to Warehouse Road, blocking entrances of offices located on Warehouse Road.
Our checks also revealed about four checkpoints from First Gate to Second Gate, mounted by security agents, where truckers are compelled to part with money before they can move.
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These problems have continued unabated as promises by government and its agencies at the port have failed to yield any positive result.
Just last week, the House of Representatives asked the Federal Government to disband the Presidential Task Team on Apapa gridlock, saying the team has outlived its usefulness and has joined in the ongoing extortion and contributing to the congestion in Lagos ports. The lawmakers also urged government and other relevant security agencies to immediately put an end to extortion of truck drivers by security operatives on the port access roads.
Leke Abejide, one of the lawmakers who sponsored a motion of ‘urgent national importance’ on the issue, said they were “concerned that in addition to the poor condition of the port access roads, extortion by officials of the Nigerian Ports Authority Security Department, Police, and the Presidential Task Force remains the major cause of unending gridlock along the port access roads, with stakeholders such as importers, clearing agents and truck owners alleging that they are forced to pay as much as N250,000 to N280,000 per truck for entries and exits to the ports”.
He said due to the challenges of inaccessibility to the ports in Lagos, businesses, commuters, and residents along the access roads see hell on a daily basis and it now takes an average of 60 days to turnaround a vessel as against the five days it used to be.
Confirming the situation, John Jenkins, managing director, Ports and Cargo Handling Services (PCHS), blamed the slow process of cargo evacuation on the deplorable state of the ports access roads.
“There are over 40 vessels at anchorage at the Tin-Can Island Port. At Port & Cargo, we could only bring in seven vessels alongside now. Last month, we kept one of the Mediterranean Shipping Company (MSC) vessels there for four days because they could not discharge, and this month, we have kept vessels for more than two days already because we don’t know where to put the containers,” Jenkins said.
“I have worked in this port industry all my life; I have never seen roads like this. We could form a palliative solution. We are not happy people are losing their means of livelihood because of the poor condition of the road,” he said.
Jonathan Nicol, president, Shippers Association of Lagos State, who confirmed in a phone interview that terminals in Tin-Can Island Port are now highly congested, said import and export goods are trapped making it difficult for vessels awaiting berth to come in to discharge.
He said, for instance, that Port and Terminal Multiservices Ltd (PTML), a modern terminal with modern technology that should exit 150 containers daily, now hardly exits 50 trucks per day.
“Given the situation, market prices of goods, especially consumables, are already going up and workers would lose their jobs because industries would shut down due to lack of raw materials. The Christmas will be bleak for so many families and with goods trapped in the ports, there will be slightly shortfall in revenue for government in the fourth quarter,” Nicol said.
He blamed the crisis in Tin-Can Port on the dilapidated roads and payment of illegal fees to traffic managers, which have made it almost impossible for cargo to be effectively evacuated from the port.
“Truckers’ operational cost is rising, cost of fuel is up and cost of maintenance is now six times more with bad roads damaging the suspension of their vehicles regularly. This is in addition to payment of unauthorised tolls to offload empty containers, among others,” said Emma Nwabunwanne, a Lagos-based importer.
In addition to high cost of transportation, he said, cargo owners are paying heavily as demurrage to shipping companies for delay in taking delivery of their consignments.
