Ship Owners Besiege Fidelity, ETB, Skye Banks for CVFF

Indigenous ship owners have besieged Fidelity, Skye, Diamond and Equitorial Trust Banks for parts of the $55 million Cabotage Vessel Financing Fund (CVFF) in effort to shore up their capacity, Nigeria CommunicationsWeek can now reveal.
At least no less than 91 applications are before the four designated banks for the CVFF under the purview of the Nigerian Maritime Administration and Safety Agency (NIMASA) established to promote the development of indigenous ship acquisition capacity by providing financial assistance to Nigerian operators in domestic coastal shipping.
The $55 million was to be pulled together by NIMASA, the banks and the benefiting shipping companies in the ratio of 50 per cent, 35 per cent and 15 per cent.
The break down showed that 23 ship owners applied for the fund at Diamond Bank, 23 at Skye Bank, 23 at Equitorial Bank and 22 at Fidelity Bank.
Mr. Temisan Omatseye, director-general of NIMASA, said”CVFF arrangements for the administration of the CVFF have reached advance stage and the first tranche of disbursement would be concluded shortly”
Local ship owners however under the aegis of Indigenous Ship Owners Association of Nigeria (ISAN) want to be involved in the planned disbursement to ensure that the fund gets to practitioners and is used for the purpose for which it is meant.
It would be recalled that the Cabotage Vessel Financing Fund recorded a significant increase from less than seven million dollars in July 2009 to over 55 million dollars in June 2010, representing an increase of 685.7 per cent.
With the increase,  Omatseye  said ”We have recorded 240 cabotage vessels in the cabotage special registry as against 45 vessels when we assumed office. This represents 450 per cent increase.”
According to him, the agency has also reviewed the guidelines for registration of cabotage operators, as it had effectively increased the tonnage in cabotage register aimed at facilitating the development of the nation‘s maritime sector.
Omatseye said that NIMASA was in the process of establishing a Regional Maritime Development Bank so as to further provide funding opportunity for ship acquisition and infrastructural development.
He said the agency had achieved 24 -hour provisional ship registration regime, adding that it had recorded 1, 318 vessels in its ship registry representing 45 per cent increase from the previous figure at the inception of his administration.