NIMASA Says 1,586 Seafarers Failed CoC Exams in 2021, Reactivates Online Platform to Check Quacks

…Says 1,593 Vessels were Inspected in 2021

By DAPO OLAWUNI

The Nigerian Maritime Administration and Safety Agency (NIMASA) has raised concerns over the number of failures recorded among Nigerian seafarers who sat for Certificate of Competency examinations in the year 2020/2020.

This is even as the agency has announced that it has revived its online seafarers Certificates of Competency verification platform in order to enable ship owners both local and international, determine the genuineness of seafarers COC before employment.

Director General of NIMASA, Dr Bashir Jamoh stated this at a press briefing he held with maritime journalists in Lagos on Friday.

While giving a breakdown of the performance of the seafarers in terms of examination and certification, the NIMASA DG said that, in the officers cadre in 2020, 829 sat for examination while total number of candidates passed and certified are 264, forming a percentage of 32%.

The total number of candidates failed is 565, forming a percentage of 68%. Total certificates revalidated for 2021 is 246.

“You can see a very serious and negative figures in terms of our students seating for professional examinations of different certificates amounting to 68% failure.

“The agency is liaising with various institutions to see how we can address this gap.
There are so many factors attached to this, and we hope that before the middle of 2022, we would overcome these challenges” he stated

Continuing, he said “In 2020, Officers examination, total number that sat for that examination was 610, and total number that passed was only 251, forming a percentage of 41% pass, while 359 failed, amounting to 59% failure.

“The total number of certificates revalidated was 132, this means that in 2021, we had 246, a considerable increase as being recorded.

“For Officers ratings, the total number that sat for the exams were 1,251, out of this, 926 passed, representing 74% passed.
The total number of candidates that failed is 325, representing 26% failure.

“The examination for ratings in 2021, the total number of students who sat for the exams are 1,327, this is a sharp increase against the 2020 figure of 1,251.
The total number of candidates passed is 990 forming also 74% passed.
Total number of candidates failed is 337 with a percentage of failure of 26%”

Dr Jamoh said that online seafarers certificates of Competency verification platform has been reactivated.

According to him, the process has drastically reduced the forgery of Nigerian certificates and enhanced the employment of Nigerians in the maritime sector.

Speaking, he said “We have been experiencing rejection and discrimination against Nigerian seafarers by shipowners both locally and internationally, this is why the agency decided to introduce the online seafarers certificates of Competency verification platform which allowed shipowners to access these candidates that passed our examinations directly from the comfort of their offices.

“With this, we reduced the forgery of our certificates and improved the standard and confidence of our certification” he said

Meanwhile, the NIMASA helmsman read out some of the achievements of the agency in terms of flag state control which has to do with survey and inspection of vessels in accordance with the safety requirements of the Merchant Shipping Act 2007.

Under condition survey, he said 489 vessels were surveyed in 2021 which is 43.6 percent higher than the total number of condition survey carried out in 2020 at 276 vessels.

He said that this is an indication of the maritime administration’s seriousness in terms of flag state survey.
This achievement according to him is despite the Covid-19 challenges.

According to him, the total number of condition survey for flag registration conducted in 2020 was 276 , while in 2021 it was 489.

For the port state control functions of NIMASA, he said 429 foreign vessels were boarded to ensure that each vessel maintained safety, pollution standards while at our ports and waters.

For the port state implementation, the 2021 figure as recorded was 675 vessels which is 24.2 % higher than the number of inspections carried out in 2020 of 510 vessels.