Seven years after port concession, most complaints and inadequacies that gave rise to it have largely persisted. The absence of a regulator in the system has remained a mitigating factor in bringing about the desired changes. It has given rise to both parties in the agreement- the landlord and the tenants-reneging on their contractual agreements. It has also enabled the concessionaires to make bogus claims of investments contrary to the present situation at the ports.

The reform embarked upon at the ports in 2004 was not without its own share of recklessness that characterizes most of Nigerian government’s policies and actions. Most notable among these, stakeholders are quick to point out, was proceeding with the concession of the ports without first putting together the necessary legal and regulatory framework as strongly as strongly advised by the consultants. The lack of regulatory framework meant the absence of a regulator that would have stemmed all the envisaged problems that have kept peace and efficiency at bay at the ports even till today.

By ignoring this important recommendation, the government threw all caution to the winds and deliberately created an environment of chaos and bitterness between the concessionaires and other stakeholders- the exact situation obtainable at the terminals today. This, perhaps, accounts for the inability of the system to achieve most of the much vaunted objectives.

The absence of a regulator means that the concessionaires are empowered to do things their own way. It means that they could not do the wrong thing and claim they are doing the right thing. It also means that they could do the wrong thing and claim they do the right time. It also means that they can invest $1 million and claim to have invested $20 million of course, who verifies their claims? And this exactly what is happening today,.

In fact, contrary to expectations, the modernization and upgrading of the port terminals have been very slow. The visible thing the concessionaire have done is pulling down old structures in their terminals and building administrative building and fencing off their individual operational areas. They have also been able to expand their staking areas, making them more comfortable for container stacking and operations.

However, up till today, some of the concessionaires are still using the old equipment they inherited from NPA. Some have today recently been able to purchase some modern and efficient handling equipment, observes say, were able to do that after making a large haul of revenue from all manner of charges.

According to stake holders, it is obvious that after paying the bid price and sundry fees, if they paid at all, the concessionaires began operations with no real investment until recently. The stakeholders claim that the concessionaires did not come with the kind of money expected to make a real change in the ports. This explains why they have been making development plants that will span years not minding that the port terminals are under concession and not outright sale. To discerning observers, these development plans are structured to reflect their expected returns on investment and large haul they expect to make from their progressive investments.
Because nobody is monitoring and checking what they are doing and they level of investment they are making, they can claim to have invested billions of dollars while all they have invested is a few million dollars.

Not long ago, the APM terminal, the leading concessionaire, was embroiled in a controversy following its claim of having world standard examination bay in its terminal. Because of the incessant complaints of its officers and men, the Customs Area Controller of Apapa Area 1 Customs Command, Comptroller Charles Edike, paid a visit to the APMT facilities in the port. The visit became an eye opener as the disappointed CAC could not see the facilities said to be of international standard. His visit opened a can of worms for the terminal operator

Prior to this incident, customs agents had been complaining of the dehumanizing condition of the so-called world-class examination bay which barely sheds them against the elements of weather as they transact business in the terminal. The customs boss frowned at the situation where his officers crowded in smoky disused containers called offices, providing their own chairs and tables. He lashed at APMT for not providing minimal comfort for the officers while claiming the contrary.
He also raised issues with the existence of muddy and dusty container-stacking spaces in the APMT, Apapa. Whenever it rains, he explained, customs officer
s wear rubber slippers and not their official footwear in order to wade through flooded platforms to examine containers, an issue agents bitterly complained about too.
Reacting to this incident, APMT , however, explained that the physical examination bay built earlier and handed over to the then port manager of the Lagos Port Complex, Mr.Joshua Asanga in 2011, could not be used by customs at the time due to ”process variance”, the Managing Director, Mr. Andrew Dawes denied insinuation of inhuman treatment of Nigerians at the physical examination bay, saying that the present condition of the examination bay is being built and would be ready by the second quarter of next year.

Dawes explained that the present examination site was not originally designed for that purpose but had to be used temporarily to ensure that the terminal is not stalled.
He said that this company placed premium on human life and has never done anything that would compromise its core values.
“The investment we are making at the terminal is not only on civil works and equipment, we are also investing to ensure the safety of everyone that comes here to transact their business”. Dawes said.

However, stakeholders are taking the explanation of Mr. Dawes with pinch of salt, as he did not address the false claim of building “world class examination bay”. These and many more are questions which not only APMT will answer but also all the other concessionaire who have been making more claims than the structures on ground.

At the 2013 ministerial briefings by ministers to highlight the mid-term achievements of president Goodluck Jonathan’s administration, the Minister of Transport, Senator Idris Umar, while giving the score-card of the transport sector, disclosed that the concessionaires have invested about NN76 billion to acquire modern cargo- handling equipments and N72 billion terminal development since 2006 when the port reform programme was effected and cargo-handling operations removed from the NPA and transferred to them. “As a result of the reforms,” he said, “he said, “the overall efficiency in the ports has been steadily improving and there is appreciable increase in infrastructure provision and maintenence by both the federal government and the concessionaires.”

To stakeholders, the minister’” assessment cannot be the true picture. If it is how come this cannot translate to a reduction in the ports despite claims to the contrary by the concessionaires, prominent among which is the APMT. If the plants and equipments which the transport minister and the management of APMT say are now in place, why are there still delay in cargo clearance and high cost of doing business in the terminal?

Henry Ogbuanu, a clearing agent, recently lamented that the cost of processing documents has continued to rise in the terminal despite claims that things are getting easier. He said APMT purposely positions containers for a number of days so that demurrage can accumulate and even when a lump sum is refunds at the end, terminal official device ways to ensure these are not returned at the end of the day.

APMT AS LEADING CONCESSIONAIRE
Of all the port concessionaire, the Danish conglomerate, AP Moeller Terminal (APMT) is constantly in the news for one reason or the other. It receives the greatest bashings and criticisms from importers, agents and stakeholders. This could be because it controls the most juicy terminal, the biggest terminal in West Africa and the second biggest container terminal in Africa’s located in Nigeria’s premier Apapa Port in Lagos.

Since 2006 when APMT won the bid to run the Apapa Port Container Terminal, it has carved the image of the best managed, efficient and stakeholder friendly of all the concessionaires. The terminal operator prides itself as having put on ground the best in terms of plants and equipments, modern information and telecommunication, managerial acumen and every other modern facility obtainable in any terminal of its kind across the globe. But despite all these claims, its customers continue to complain bitterly about operational problems, high demurrage and exhort charges which are stifling their businesses. The concessionaire, the stakeholders say, has not been able to satisfy or improve their fortunes by ensuring that those pre-concession encumbrances are removed to their benefit.

Death of Lilypond Off Dock Terminal

In addition to the barrage of criticism against APMT, observers allege that in a bid to maximize profit to the detriment of other stakeholders, APMT prefers to warehouse all containers in her terminal for the sole reason of collecting demurrages. This is one reason they say nearby bonded container depots that are supposed to be fed from the terminal have become ghost towns with no activities. The terminals are deliberately starved of containers so that all attention will be directed to the Apapa Container Terminal Complex. This is done even when the danger of congestion is looming in the horizon.

Last August, the bombshell and a major drawback on the port concession came when the management of the Lilypond Container Terminal Ltd, an off-dock terminal of AP Moller Ltd decided to close shop. Announcing the closure, Mr. Tristram Denyer, the manager, said the company had been running at a loss since 2006 when it won 10 years concession for the terminal. Since 2006, the company invested over 15 million USD to revive the former Lilypond Termiinal in order to bring it to world-class standard. But in place of recouping her investment, a debt profile of 5 million USD had been incurred as at the end of July 2013 owing to a bad business environment. The bad business environment, according to Denyer, is attributable to the instability of APMT, her parent company, to stem containers to the terminal. “Frustrated by a number of factors including the lack of overflow container volume available for ports generally, the high cost of operating the depot and increased capacity in Nigerian maritime container terminals” all combined to force Lilypond Container Terminal Ltd to throw in the towel.

Condemning the role of APMT in the current travails of Lilypond Container Terminal Ltd, prominent freight forwarder and founder, National AssociatIon of Government Approved Freight Forwarders (NAGAFF), Dr Boniface Aniebonam observed that Lilypond Container Terminal Ltd started to encounter problems when APMT stopped moving cargoes to the Ijora-based terminal. Rather than moving some containers to the base to ease congestion in her own facilities at Apapa port, he stated, APMT prefers piling containers for days so that importers can pay for storage.

Corroborating this view, Prince Taiye Oyeniyi, Secretary, Board of Trustees of the Association of Nigerian Customs Licensed Agents (ANCLA) accused APMT of a deliberate plan to stifle operations in the terminal as part of her continuing efforts to take over all ports operations in Nigerian Ports. He alleged that APMT, prior to Lilypond Container Terminal’s decision to throw owing to what it terms harrowing experiences in the hands of some of the in the towel, had refused to feed her with containers even as containers were struggling for parking spaces at her own terminal in Apapa port.

“They have dominated the maritime sector and they are going to kill it gradually. What they are doing is window-dressing because if you want to position a container at Apapa port, you are given two weeks and nobody is asking questions.” Oyeniyi recalled the advice of stakeholders, the Nigerian Customs Service inclusive; on how best to revive the Lilypond Container Terminal Ltd, an opportunity the parent company (APMT Ltd) would have taken to, perhaps, forestall the winding up of business at the off-dock terminal last August.