NMU bill to be passed soon - House of Representatives

The House of Representatives has assured that the bill establishing the Nigerian Maritime University Okerenkoko will soon be passed into law to allow adequate funding of the institution.

This was disclosed on Thursday 14, when members of the Committee on Maritime Safety delegation for oversight, led by the deputy chairman, Hon. Uduak Alphonsus Odudoh visits Nigeria Maritime University, Okerenkoko.

Speaking with the press, Uduak, leader of the delegation expressed thus:

"We decided to come here to see things for ourselves. Coming here, we've discovered a lot of challenges. And like I was telling our brothers from the Northern part of Nigeria and that Niger Delta is the goose that lays the golden egg graciously. The Nigerian government established this university, and now the current government has also established minister of blue economy. If this university is properly funded, it will add a lot of value to the blue economy ministry and to Nigeria at large. 

"We've gone to the permanent sites. We've gone to the temporary site and all the land donated by the community and let me use this opportunity to immensely on behalf of the committee. And the National Assembly House of Reps in particular, to the town and the Tompolo Foundation, because from our assessment, and from our report, temporary reports, as you see, 40% of what we've seen here and even in other campuses that we've gone is done by Tompolo foundation. We really commend him and also the community for graciously donating their land. That means they want development. That means they want this school to get to its destination. 

"So when we get back as a committee, we have asked the management of this institution to bring out the challenge bullet point, point by point so that as a house, we should be able to take it up.

"We have a speaker that is listening, if you look at the speeches he had made so far, you will see that the speaker is people oriented. He loves Nigeria, so by the time we take these challenges from the committee level, we take it to the leadership of the National Assembly. You know, a lot of these problems will be solved. 

"If we did not come here, the lawyer said the documents speak for itself. We've come here and we've seen the challenges, even the road to the permanent site. At some point we have to come down from the bus and trek, and this is even dry season. Imagine what will happen during rainy season.

"Let me also thank the people that are walking in the university, if you don't have a sacrificial mind, you cannot walk in the university. That is the truth because of the environment, the terrain.

"Well, I thank God there's a good security in this place, I also thank the community who has ensured that the security is not a challenge for the students and the staff. But I want to assure the Vice Chancellor and the people that we will be coming from time to time.

"When we go back, we'll look at your budgets, where necessary, we will increase. I will also ensure that we'll reach out to the relevant agency, especially NIMASA from records in 2022, NIMASA even tried to do some releases, in 2023 there was a great decrease and so we've find out the reason. Thank God we have a new D.G now, recently appointed by Mr. President a few days ago, we will work in collaboration with every other agencies to ensure that there's funding, because the major problem of this place is inadequate funding. And so we'll do our best to ensure that the place is funded and so that they can also compete favourably. Like other universities outside Nigeria.

"Recently, the bill unfortunately was passed by the previous house. It was not assented to Mr. President. And so the bill is now before the Senate from the information available to us. It has passed through second reading and also in the House of Reps. And so we are going to work with the speed of light to ensure that the bill is passed. 

"We will ensure that we reach out to remind people to ensure that the bill is passed into law. And so that the university can kick start very well with its own act like the Maritime Academy, Oron, and that is why Oron is even more funded than here, because compulsory, constitutionally, by the act of NIMASA. They are supposed to remove 5% of their earnings to other places, and that is their main source of funding. 

"We will surely ensure that the bill is passed as we go back so that every other thing that should come to the university will not be denied," he stated.

On his part, Vice Chancellor of NMU, Engr, Prof. Emmanuel Munakorogha Adigio pleaded with the appropriate authorities to increase the funding to enable qualified staff to work in the academy and also added challenges they're facing.

On his words, "Our challenges are transportation, no light here, and because of cost of diesel, we run one or two hours per day of light to get water for the students. We have accommodation problems for our staff, we've gone very far with students' accommodation, I think some of the buildings will be ready for the students. But staff accommodation is very necessary, because this is a very remorse community and to provide houses for staff is a very difficult thing. We can’t leave it for the community alone. 

"People from external can come and build houses, for the students of the University.

"The main thing to solve this problem is to increase the funding of the university. Because this is a university that was initiated by NIMASA, and now that they're on board, we're pleading with them to increase the funding, or to reinstall the funding, and even increase it to enable a qualified staff to come-in here. Because of the location, we really need to entice people with a little bit of allowances.

"We've started collaborating with the Nigerian Navy, we've gone to Nigerians Defence Academy, we have even an MOU with them, we also contribute by teaching and taking some of the programmes they have there. So we're already connected with the army," he stated.