In this interview, with ANOZIE EGOLE, the Managing Director of the NLNG Shipping and Marine Services Limited, Mr. Abdulkadir Ahmed, speaks on the challenges with the Nigerian Seafarers Development Program, among others

You said 2024 was a good year for NSML. Can you tell us how?

I can tell you it was our best year, whether from a profitability point of view or an operations point of view. But actually, what we are even most proud of is that it was our best year from a safety point of view. For us, the profitability bit is just on the side, it’s what we call the icing on the cake. We are in business primarily to deliver on those core tenets of why we were set up. To run a safe business, provide safety, ensure the assets under us are managed reliably so that they can be available, and create value. Now, value isn’t just about finances. Value is the service that we provide to our customers, to our stakeholders. So when we say it was our best year, it was our best year financially, but most importantly, it was our best year operationally and safety-wise.

To what extent have you achieved your Nigerianisation policy?

We have a Nigerianisation objective or goal that we have defined a very long time ago. We are a Nigerian company and, of course, we were created to provide opportunities for Nigerian seafarers to participate in the Liquefied Natural Gas shipping industry. So we defined a Nigerianisation objective, which is that we want to have, at every moment, 85 per cent of our crew onboard our vessels, Nigerians, across all cadres. Again, it’s about ensuring that we are open to the world. The shipping industry, by its nature, opens up to the world. When I talk about standards, it’s a global standard. And you want to have a cross-fertilisation of cultures, of ideas. I hope you understand what I’m saying. So that was why we kept 15 per cent, to say we would have other nationalities. And today, we have Polish, Ukrainians, Indians, Malaysians, and Filipinos, on our vessels. And it helps, when you go there, it’s one family, everybody is an NSML staff. You don’t have NSML Nigerian staff, everybody is NSML staff. They go on board, they work together, they collaborate, they run the vessels, and they run them professionally. We were able to attain our 85 per cent two years ago. So, for example, people will leave, that’s normal, people will be promoted, and we will have additional vessels to manage. We have been growing our vessels under management consistently. We just took a new, advanced mega vessel, called Axios, It’s a mega vessel. It’s a sister vessel of the Arcturus. Remember the Arcturus that we took last year? So we took a new one, just last month. We took a new vessel under our management. And it’s something we’re proud of. It’s one of the most advanced LNG vessels in operation in the world today. We are one of the few, as small as we are, of the few, technical ship managers with that kind of vessel under management. And we are providing opportunities for Nigerians to sail on those vessels. So, from a Nigerian point of view, we are very happy with where we are, as a company. We have met our targets; we aim to exceed those targets. But from the office side, we are 100 per cent Nigerians in the office. The entire leadership, the entire crew, and the staff members in the office are Nigerians.

Tell us more about the cadetship program?

Now, the Nigerian Maritime Administration and Safety Agency is the co-sponsor of Nigerian cadets, under the Nigerian Seafarers Development Program. Part of their certification program is to go on board, and have their sea time and that is a very fundamental aspect of their certification. So they go to the colleges first, then they go on board, and then they go back to the colleges for their final exams. So we, in conjunction with NMASA, have been one of the most consistent, in terms of providing sea time, for Nigerian cadets. So far, almost 300 cadets have sailed on our vessels, and we take this very seriously. Because it is in line with the desire to deepen the Nigerian maritime sector. We are one of the few companies with ocean-going vessels in Nigeria today. We are the only LNG technical management company, I dare say, in Sub-Saharan Africa today. So the opportunity that we give them to be on those vessels is top-notch. But most importantly, it is also a funnel for us. They come on our vessel, they train on our vessel, and we imbibe them with our standards, with our culture. And they go back to their colleges, and finish, and we can also, where the opportunities are, recruit from that group. And so far, almost 100 have been recruited within NSML. So we are very proud of that. I am sure some of you were here when we had the induction program for the Romanian Cadets, and those are people who unfortunately went to Romania and finished, but unfortunately, their certifications were not recognised. We stepped in to provide a solution to NIMASA, which is simply that they will go on our vessels, and I think about 65 of them are already on the vessels. They are about to finish their sea time, and then they will go to a maritime academy in the United Kingdom for their certification. So we are exploring multiple ways, to provide solutions and provide opportunities.

Tell us about your collaboration with the Maritime Academy of Nigeria, Oron?

Now we collaborate with the Maritime Academy of Nigeria, Oron. In 2014, if I remember correctly, we actually went to the school, evaluated their curriculum, identified their needs, and supported the upgrading of their facilities then. Some of our top management today all went to the maritime academy. The first Nigerian LNG Captain went to a maritime academy. We got him from there, and we sent him on further courses. So we have a good relationship with the maritime academy. And currently, we have even developed a program where we’re taking their cadets for industrial attachments. I think currently we have about 20 students from the school on industrial attachment, and this is the first time we are taking students on that from MAN, Oron. All to ensure that we provide a platform for their training and development. Now, there is a fundamental problem, but then, we are all in business to solve problems. The problem is the certification, the NMASA-accredited certification. Unfortunately, the NMASA-accredited certificate is not recognised internationally for ocean-going. So, maritime academies, as good as they are, in terms of their facility and their curriculum, at the moment, we do have a certificate recognition problem. But that’s something that we are discussing, and we are working with NMASA to find a way to resolve that. It’s more of an organisational issue than anything else. It’s not a quality issue. Let me be very frank, it’s not a quality issue; it’s a quality assurance issue. I hope you understand what I am saying. I may believe you are good. But my word would not count for somebody else. Somebody needs to have said, okay, what is the assurance process to ensure, you are good today, and you will be good tomorrow. And that is where the discussion with NMASA is going on. How do we support NMASA to upgrade their systems, their processes, to ensure others internationally can come in and say, yes, we believe, and we assure ourselves that your systems and processes of accreditation are good? It’s just a matter of perception. So those works are still ongoing. Unfortunately, because we are ocean-going, our vessels call at various international destinations. We cannot have NMASA-trained officers with Certificate-of-Competency on those vessels yet, because those certifications are not fully accepted internationally yet. But we are working towards that. We can resolve the ratings certification.

Is it safe to say that with your certification, you can take and train cadets on your own?

There’s a Maritime Academy, which is the baseline. That’s the baseline institution for the provision of maritime training. The Maritime Centre of Excellence is an Advanced Marine Training Institute. So, it’s like going to university, let’s put it to university, they are the only ones that will issue you a degree certificate. But with all the necessary certifications to ensure that your degree remains relevant and up to date, you can go to other institutes. That’s what MCOE is. So, we are not competing with the Maritime Academy or other maritime institutions. No. We are rather complementary. They are the ones that provide the basic training and COC certification. What then happens is that the additional courses over and above what you can achieve, which we are seeing now, have been accreted for a couple of those courses. And that’s what MCOE aims to be: an advanced maritime training institute that can provide advanced maritime certification in specific courses. Then we aligned ourselves with the MCA. The MCA is the UK Coast Guard and Marine Agency. They are accredited; it’s deemed to be the gold standard of maritime certificate accreditation in the world today. So, we have a partnership with an institution in the UK. The plan in place this year is to upgrade the MCOE both in terms of facility, resources, and courses so that the centre itself is 100 per cent accredited by the MCA. And what we then intend to do in doing such is that anybody who is a seafarer who needs advanced certification doesn’t have to go to the UK or anywhere else to go and get that today, they can come to MCOE. Like I said, it’s, again, it’s a plan, we haven’t implemented. First of all, we have to upgrade the centre, but we have started. Part of that is that we have achieved accreditation of two courses. They have done an audit of our facility. They have identified the things that we need to do. We need to have more. They have acknowledged what we have, and that’s why they have accredited those two courses. But we want to go beyond specific course accreditation. We want to go for full centre accreditation, which is why we are upgrading the facility. We are increasing the courses and the resources provided to MCOE to be able to do that.

You don’t need to go anywhere to go and do it, you can come to Bornny and do it, and it’s as good as you have gone to the UK to do it. MCOE doesn’t provide the COC what we are providing is, when you have the COC, is the additional certification. For example, the COC will not give you a basic tanker course.