Shippers Council; a new Sheriff in Town As Tinubu Signs NPERA Bill
Barr Pius Ukeyima Akutah
President Bola Ahmed Tinubu has assented to the Nigerian Ports Economic Regulatory Agency (NPERA) Bill, 2026, giving the Nigerian Shippers’ Council (NSC) who is the port economic regulator, the full legal backing and stronger enforcement powers, and ending over three years of stakeholders’ apprehension over the fate of the law.
The development was announced by the Executive Secretary/CEO of the Nigerian Shippers’ Council, Dr Pius Akutah, who took to his verified Facebook page to express appreciation to the President. “Nigerian Port Economic Regulatory Agency Act, 2026. Thank you Mr. President for making it a reality,” Akutah stated
Although details of the President’s assent and the implementation framework remained sketchy as of press time, the development represents a major milestone in Nigeria’s long-running efforts to establish a statutory economic regulatory framework for the port industry.
Experts say it also paves the way for a full economic regulator with the powers to sanction erring operators, ending what stakeholders describe as years of impunity among some operators.
The NPERA legislation has been in the works for several years, with successive National Assemblies attempting to establish a dedicated port economic regulator following the concession of Nigeria’s ports. The Federal Government had, in 2014, designated the Nigerian Shippers’ Council as interim economic regulator of the ports pending the enactment of a substantive law.
The absence of a dedicated Act had, however, left the Council performing its economic regulatory functions largely on the strength of government policy and regulations rather than a comprehensive statutory framework.
The proposed legislation seeks to give the port economic regulator stronger legal backing to oversee economic activities in the sector, including tariffs, rates, charges, competition, licensing of port service providers and the resolution of commercial disputes.
Akutah had previously described the proposed NPERA regime as a transition towards a more structured and efficient port regulatory system, saying the legislation would establish a strong and independent regulatory framework with enforceable legal powers.
The journey to the new law has not been without controversy. Earlier versions of the legislation attracted concerns from stakeholders and some maritime agencies over possible duplication of functions, particularly with the Nigerian Ports Authority (NPA) and the Nigerian Maritime Administration and Safety Agency (NIMASA).
Stakeholders had called for clearer delineation of responsibilities to prevent regulatory conflicts and overlapping mandates.
Both chambers of the National Assembly had concurrently passed the Bill late last year, and it was promptly transmitted to President Tinubu for assent. The President, however, returned the Bill to the National Assembly after it was discovered during review that certain provisions conflicted with the Nigerian Tax Administration Act (NTAA), 2025. This led to the setting up of a technical committee, comprising members drawn from both chambers of the National Assembly and legal drafting experts from the Directorate of Legal Services, to begin fresh legislative work on the Bill and recommend the necessary corrections.
The National Assembly subsequently revisited the Bill, corrected the identified issues and passed an amended, harmonised version in April 2026. The Senate’s fresh passage followed the rescission of its earlier decision after a review identified legal and procedural issues requiring correction.
The harmonised Bill was later transmitted to the President for his final assent.
While details of the implementation framework remain unclear at the time of filing this report, stakeholders have expressed excitement over the passage of the new Act, insisting it heralds a new phase of order and sanity in port economic regulation. A freight forwarder, speaking on condition of anonymity, said that although it is still too early to discuss implementation strategies, the passage of the Act signals that there is a new sheriff in town, one that will not tolerate the imposition of exorbitant tariffs and charges, ushering in a new era of a tariff-service regime as against the erstwhile arbitrariness.
The Nigerian Shippers’ Council was established in 1978 through the NSC Act to protect the interest of Nigerian shippers. Its mandate was later expanded to include economic regulation of the port industry pursuant to the Port Economic Regulator Order, 2015, an order that followed inadequacies which arose after the concession of the ports in 2006, when private terminal operators came in and created the need to regulate tariffs and charges.
This necessitated a review of the NSC Act to harmonise all the regulations into the NPERA Bill.
Prior to this, the Council operated under a 2015 government gazette, which set out its roles and functions as port economic regulator and aimed to create an effective regulatory regime covering all port stakeholders for the control of tariffs, rates, charges and other related economic services.
That gazette, however, was implemented as a regulation rather than an Act, with significant limitations: it provided only that the NSC should perform the role of interim port economic regulator with the administrative backing of the Federal Government, and that from 2015, every regulated service provider in Nigerian ports should register with and be answerable to the Council.
This gave rise to the need to repeal the NSC Act in order to empower the Council to fully discharge its mandate as port economic regulator, a dream that has now been realised.
With the President’s assent, the long-awaited transition from the existing interim regulatory arrangement to a statutory port economic regulatory regime moves closer to implementation.
The development is expected to be closely watched by terminal operators, shipping companies, freight forwarders, importers, exporters and other port stakeholders, particularly over how the new agency will handle tariffs, charges, competition and disputes within the Nigerian port system. Akutah has said the emergence of NPERA will ultimately create a more solid regulatory foundation for the sector, contributing to a more efficient, competitive and investment-friendly maritime industry.
The immediate next steps are expected to include clarification of the commencement date, transition arrangements from the Nigerian Shippers’ Council to NPERA, the agency’s governing structure, and the specific regulatory powers and functions that will become operational under the new Act.
