Fisheries Act Slams Ridiculous N500 Fine on Perpetrators of IUU Fishing

…Anishere Says There is no Law Commensurate to Deter Foreigners Plundering Nigerian Waterways

By DAPO OLAWUNI

Fresh indications have emerged that perpetrators of Illegal Unregulated and Unreported Fishing (IUU Fishing) are emboldened to continously plunder Nigerian waterways because there is no regulation adequate enough to deter them from committing the offense.

Maritime lawyer and Senior Advocate of Nigeria, Mrs Jean Chiazor Anishere SAN, made the revelation on Friday at a workshop organised by the Nigerian Maritime Administration and Safety Agency (NIMASA) for House of Representatives members on the need to review some outdated maritime laws and regulations, so as to allow Nigeria enjoy the benefits of its Blue Economy.

Anishere stressed the need to review
the Fisheries Act, saying that it is stated in the Act that, where the owner of a fishing craft, has failed to license his craft, such owner will be punished by a fine of N500 or six months imprisonment.

“Not N5,000, not N500,000, but N500 or six months imprisonment. The ridiculousity of this Act is the fact that, I do not see how six months imprisonment is commensurate to N500.

“But then again, I look at the year the act was made, this was 1967, so surely, that is probably when one Naira is equivalent to one pound. Hence N500 could be seen to be such a huge amount of money to attract six months imprisonment.

“But in the Nigeria of today, 2024, we all know that if it retains N500, it is a ridiculous amount of money. So we need to review the Act.

“If we retain the N500, then anyone can go ahead and commit all the crimes in fisheries, because they can afford to pay N500 fine. So, we can obviously see that there is a need
to review that Fisheries Act, in order to meet the reality of today.

“Finally on fisheries and aquaculture, it is also observed that the predominance of fishing in our country is done by artisans. But there is no provision for that in the Fisheries Act.

“Even in our constitution, there is no
provision, no regulations for these artisans. So, this has actually been a major problem in our country. And it has actually led to a situation where we have the Illegal, Unreported and Unregulated Fishing, the offence that is being committed by foreigners.

“We see some Ghanaians, some of our brothers from West African countries come to our territorial
waters to poach. And because we don’t have laws that are adequate or commensurate to deter the offence of illegal aquaculture, we are not allowed to prosecute.

“Unless and until we review these regulations, these policies, harnessing the blue economy is just a fiasco” she said

The maritime lawyer also observed that the Ministry of Agriculture and
Rural Development have since been replaced with Ministry of Agriculture and Food Security, hence the need to review some of the Acts under the Ministry.