Anastasia Okechukwu Reporting
The Federal Government, FG, on Thursday, said that big cargoes will soon berth at the concessioned Onitsha River Port in Anambra State.
The Managing Director, National Inland Waterways Authority, (NIWA), George Moghalu, after a meeting with the president at the presidential Villa in Abuja, disclose this while speaking to State House Correspondence.
According to him, “For Onitsha river port, we have successfully concessioned and handed over to universal Elysium, it is a company that is partnering with Port of Antwerp for the next 30 years.
He further said that because of limited resources and to reduce pressure on government, the FG has opened up discussion with other interested organizations and unsolicited proposals have come for the concessioning of Baro, for the concessioning of Oguta and Lokoja which is still under construction.
He, therefore explained that the advantage of allowing organizations own the port was to reduce pressure from the government because the Organizations will have to complete the port and put it to use but royalty will be paid to the government.
The managing Director also spoke on Oguto River Port not being part of the FG budget for a while but eventually the FG thought on working on it.
“As we speak, we have finished fencing of the Oguta river port. And we’re doing little by little, depending on resources available to put in place some basic infrastructure that is required for a port to operate”, He added.
“Same is applicable to Lokoja. So we’re taking it from two perspectives. Completing the building by government and concession or concession it so that the new concessionaire can complete the ports and put it to effective use,” He said.
Moghalu, when asked by journalists on when the big ships are expected to berth on Onitsha River Port, said “very soon”.
He continued that before the concession, he was able to do a test run, move cargo between Onne and Onitsha, which was successful and so the movement of cargo from Lagos to Onitsha is almost been concluded on.