Tolu Ogunlesi's Tweets About The Revival Of The Eastern Ports

I think we all agree that Nigeria needs to move more cargo/containers away from Lagos and to the Ports in the Eastern flank of Nigeria (Calabar, PH, Warri, Onne, etc), right? Lagos Ports are clearly overburdened - no doubt about that.


Here’s something quite interesting:

Things have been looking up for the Eastern Ports since 2017. Still a long way to go, but you can see a coming-alive.

The revival started in Calabar Port in Oct 2017, when two flat-bottomed vessels (200m) berthed there, carrying wheat:

MV Desert Ranger, and
MV Desert Harrier

One of the biggest challenges with the Eastern Ports is the limitations in channel draft. In layman’s terms, they are too shallow for large vessels. Need to be dredged. While plans for dredging are being sorted, the Nigerian Ports Authority (@nigerianports) decided to encourage flatbottomed vessels to berth.

Getting the two vessels (owned by a Greek Co) to break a jinx of sorts and berth in Calabar in Oct 2017 was no small feat - the Company had to be convinced; ship captains had to receive special training to navigate the Calabar Port channel. And then there was Pilot Mohammed Bida.

Pilot Mohammed Bida is the @nigerianports tugboat pilot whose task it was to “pilot” the vessels into the Harbour when they arrived in Calabar. News reports say he was rewarded with a Best Worker of the Year Award in 2017, as well as double promotion from Grade level 09 to 12.