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EFCC, Customs Close Ranks to Choke Off Smuggling and Money Laundering at Nigeria’s Borders
EFCC, Customs Close Ranks to Choke Off Smuggling and Money Laundering at Nigeria’s Borders
By Okeoghene Onoriobe, Waterways News, Lagos April 15, 2026
The Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) has thrown its weight behind its growing partnership with the Nigeria Customs Service (NCS), signalling that the two agencies are tightening their joint grip on smuggling networks and financial crime operations feeding off Nigeria’s trade corridors.
Speaking during a high-level engagement in Kano, EFCC Acting Zonal Director Friday Ebelo said the collaboration is already yielding tangible results — illicit goods intercepted, funds recovered and high-profile suspects arrested. He credited the gains to a deliberate effort by both agencies to understand each other’s operational mandates and align their enforcement strategies.
“No single agency can combat cross-border crime alone,” Ebelo said, stressing that intelligence sharing and joint enforcement are essential to protecting national revenue and disrupting the financial networks that sustain organised criminal groups.
The visit was led by the Commandant of the Nigeria Customs Command and Staff College, Gaura, who brought students for an immersive look at how the EFCC conducts its operations. Gaura commended the Commission’s transparency and operational efficiency, noting that modern Customs work has long outgrown the border post — it now demands intelligence-led financial investigation skills that are built through exactly this kind of interagency exposure.
The engagement covered a lecture on interagency cooperation, interactive sessions on intelligence sharing and joint investigations, and a focused discussion on managing seized assets connected to currency smuggling and financial crimes.
For a country whose ports and waterways remain entry points for contraband — from petroleum products and narcotics to foreign currencies — the deepening of this EFCC-Customs alliance carries direct implications for maritime enforcement. Smuggling routes that exploit Nigeria’s coastline and inland waterways often rely on the same financial infrastructure that both agencies are now working to dismantle together.
Waterways News | waterwaysnews.ng
MARAN President Onigbinde Wins Maritime Reporter of the Year at Transport Day Awards
By Ighoyota Onaibre | Waterways News
Oluyinka Onigbinde, President of the Maritime Reporters’ Association of Nigeria (MARAN), has been named Maritime Reporter of the Year at the 12th Nigerian Transport Lecture and Awards organised by Transport Day Media — a recognition that underscores the growing visibility of dedicated maritime journalism within Nigeria’s broader transport discourse.
The award was presented before an assembly of senior stakeholders from Nigeria’s transport, ports, and blue economy sectors, with organisers citing Onigbinde’s consistency in industry reporting, his in-depth policy coverage, and his sustained commitment to advancing informed public conversation on Nigeria’s maritime development.
This year’s lecture, themed “Intermodal Transportation Safety in Nigeria: Prospects, Challenges and Contributions to National Growth,” drew policymakers, regulators, transport operators, and media professionals. Former Federal Road Safety Corps (FRSC) Corps Marshal Boboye Oyeyemi delivered the keynote, focusing on safety improvements across all modes of transport in Nigeria.
Onigbinde, who also serves as Assistant Editor of Shipping Position Daily, has built a reputation over the years for rigorous coverage of Nigeria’s ports, shipping operations, customs administration, freight forwarding, and blue economy policy. His work has included investigative reports, exclusive interviews, and analysis of port reform and trade facilitation issues that directly shape the operating environment for maritime industry practitioners.
His emergence as MARAN President adds a leadership dimension to his journalism profile. In that role, he has pledged to strengthen the association’s engagement with industry stakeholders and uphold the standards of credible maritime reporting in Nigeria.
Receiving the award, Onigbinde dedicated the recognition to colleagues, mentors, MARAN members, and the wider industry community that has supported his career. He described the honour as both humbling and a renewed obligation to pursue factual, balanced, and impactful reporting — one that contributes meaningfully to the growth of Nigeria’s maritime and transport sectors.
The Transport Day Media Awards are widely regarded as one of the sector’s key platforms for acknowledging individuals and organisations whose work has advanced Nigeria’s transport ecosystem through policy advocacy, operational excellence, and media coverage.
Nigeria Watch
The recognition of a maritime journalist at a national transport forum carries significance beyond the individual being honoured. It reflects a growing acknowledgement within Nigeria’s policy and industry circles that quality maritime journalism is not peripheral to sector development — it is part of the infrastructure of accountability.
Nigeria’s maritime sector operates in an environment where regulatory opacity, concession disputes, cabotage compliance gaps, and port efficiency challenges remain persistent concerns for operators. The quality of journalism covering these issues directly affects how well-informed stakeholders, investors, and policymakers are when making decisions that shape the blue economy.
MARAN, under new leadership, has an opportunity to push for stronger press accreditation standards at key maritime regulatory bodies — including NIMASA and the NPA — greater information flow from government agencies to the maritime press, and structured platforms for engagement between reporters and technical experts in shipping, logistics, and port operations.
Nigerian maritime journalism, when at its best, performs a watchdog function that complements the work of regulators. Recognising its practitioners at the highest levels of the transport sector is a step in the right direction.
Lagos Deputy Speaker Throws Weight Behind 8th WISTA Africa Conference
By Samson Onoharigho | Waterways News
The Deputy Speaker of the Lagos State House of Assembly, Rt. Hon. Mojisola Lasbat Meranda, has pledged her support for the 8th WISTA Africa Regional Conference and confirmed she will personally attend the continental maritime event, billed to take place in Lagos later this month.
Meranda gave the commitment when she received a delegation of the Women’s International Shipping and Trading Association (WISTA) Nigeria, led by its President, Dr. Odunayo Ani, during a courtesy visit to her office. The visit formed part of WISTA Nigeria’s pre-conference stakeholder outreach, targeting key institutional and legislative voices ahead of the gathering expected to draw policymakers, maritime regulators, industry operators, development partners, academics and professionals from across Africa.
Ani formally invited the Deputy Speaker and women across Lagos State to participate in the conference, scheduled for June 25 and 26, 2026, at Eko Hotel and Suites, Victoria Island, Lagos. She said the event, themed “From Policy to Implementation: Women Advancing Africa’s Blue Economy through Sustainable Shipping, Trade and Energy Innovation,” would focus on translating high-level policy commitments into concrete, sector-wide action.
The WISTA Nigeria president underscored Lagos’s pivotal role in Africa’s maritime economy, arguing that the visible participation of women leaders from the state would lend significant weight to ongoing advocacy for broader female representation in maritime decision-making, innovation, and economic governance.
A group photograph of WISTA Nigeria delegation with the Lagos Deputy Speaker, during a courtesy visit last week
“The support and participation of women leaders in Lagos State will enrich discussions and help advance the drive for greater female representation and inclusion across Africa’s maritime and blue economy sectors,” Ani said.
She also called on the Lagos State House of Assembly to mobilise women across the state for the conference, describing it as a rare platform for shaping a more inclusive and equitable future for Africa’s blue economy.
Responding warmly, Meranda commended WISTA Nigeria’s consistent contributions to championing women in the maritime industry and reaffirmed her longstanding relationship with the association. She confirmed her attendance and pledged active support for initiatives geared toward widening women’s participation across the blue economy value chain.
Nigeria Watch
The 8th WISTA Africa Regional Conference arrives at a moment of heightened policy activity in Nigeria’s maritime sector — from ongoing cabotage reform conversations and the CVFF disbursement saga to the broader push to position Nigeria as the hub of Africa’s blue economy. That WISTA Nigeria chose Lagos as the host city is no accident: with the Apapa and Tin Can Island ports, the emerging Lekki Deep Seaport complex, and the administrative machinery of NIMASA and the NPA all concentrated in the commercial capital, Lagos remains the operational heartbeat of Nigeria’s shipping industry.
What stands out about this edition is the deliberate legislative buy-in. Securing the endorsement of the Lagos Deputy Speaker is not merely symbolic — it signals an attempt to build bridges between the maritime industry and the lawmaking architecture that ultimately shapes port governance, cabotage enforcement, and blue economy investment policy. For an industry that has long complained of regulatory fragmentation and legislative indifference, that kind of outreach matters.
The conference theme — moving from policy to implementation — also resonates sharply in the Nigerian context. Nigeria has no shortage of blue economy frameworks, maritime masterplans, and gender inclusion commitments on paper. The harder challenge, as industry stakeholders consistently note, is converting those documents into enforceable regulation, funded programmes, and genuine career pathways — particularly for women, who remain significantly underrepresented at the senior levels of Nigerian shipping, port management, and maritime trade.
Port operators, shipowners, freight forwarders and terminal managers attending the June 25–26 conference would do well to engage the implementation-focused sessions closely. The conversations there are likely to feed back into the policy pipeline affecting their operations.
Waterways News | Maritime & Blue Economy Reporting
Nigeria Projects Blue Economy Vision at Our Ocean Conference in Mombasa
By Okeoghene Onoriobe | Waterways News Correspondent
Nigeria has stepped onto the global stage to assert its maritime ambitions, with the Minister of State for Foreign Affairs, Ambassador Sola Enikanolaiye, representing President Bola Tinubu at the Our Ocean Conference currently holding in Mombasa, Kenya.
The three-day summit, running from June 16 to 18, convenes heads of state, ministers, investors, environmental advocates, policymakers and civil society leaders to advance concrete solutions for protecting the world’s oceans while unlocking their economic potential. Since its founding in 2014, the conference has built a reputation as one of the world’s most outcome-driven environmental forums, with a strong record of converting pledges into verifiable action.
This year’s edition places Africa’s blue economy at the centre of deliberations, acknowledging its role in sustaining more than 50 million livelihoods across the continent’s 38 coastal nations. Key discussions are focused on persistent threats to marine ecosystems — illegal, unreported and unregulated (IUU) fishing, plastic pollution, rising ocean temperatures and the urgent need for expanded marine protected areas.
Nigeria is expected to use the platform to articulate its position as West Africa’s foremost maritime nation, drawing attention to ongoing efforts to develop its blue economy framework, reinforce maritime security architecture in the Gulf of Guinea, and improve ocean health across its coastline and exclusive economic zone (EEZ). The delegation is also expected to advance engagement with international partners on mechanisms to scale up sustainable ocean-based industries and deepen regional cooperation frameworks.
The conference programme extends beyond diplomatic exchanges to include investment forums, a BlueTech exhibition, youth leadership tracks and specialised policy clinics designed to drive innovation in climate adaptation and sustainable ocean governance. Organisers expect the gathering to catalyse fresh inflows of public and private capital into marine conservation and sustainable fisheries management.
Nigeria Watch
Nigeria’s participation in the Our Ocean Conference comes at a moment when the country’s blue economy agenda is still more aspiration than architecture. While the Tinubu administration has spoken broadly of harnessing Nigeria’s vast ocean resources — from fisheries and aquaculture to offshore energy and maritime tourism — the policy frameworks and funding mechanisms needed to convert that vision into commercial reality remain largely underdeveloped.
For Nigeria’s port operators, terminal managers and shipping stakeholders, the Mombasa summit carries practical significance beyond the diplomatic optics. International ocean governance commitments increasingly intersect with commercial maritime operations: stricter IUU fishing enforcement, expanded marine protected zones and emerging blue carbon markets all have direct implications for how shipping lanes, offshore logistics corridors and coastal port infrastructure are managed.
Equally notable is the investment dimension. The Our Ocean Conference has historically generated significant financing pledges for ocean-related projects. Nigeria’s ability to attract a share of that capital — particularly for port decarbonisation, offshore wind development and blue infrastructure along the Lagos-Calabar coastal corridor — will depend on whether Abuja can present bankable project pipelines backed by credible regulatory frameworks, rather than broad thematic declarations.
NIMASA’s ongoing efforts to modernise Nigeria’s maritime regulatory environment and the NPA’s port expansion programme are relevant foundations, but without coordinated blue economy legislation and dedicated funding mechanisms, Nigeria risks being a spectator at forums that are reshaping the global maritime investment landscape.
The question Mombasa should sharpen for Nigerian policymakers is straightforward: will the country leave with commitments, or with capital?
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