Blue Economy
How NPA’s One-Stop-Shop is Turning Nigeria Into Africa’s Petroleum Export Powerhouse
How NPA’s One-Stop-Shop is Turning Nigeria Into Africa’s Petroleum Export Powerhouse
By Okeoghene Onoriobe | Waterways News Correspondent | Lagos
Nigeria’s ambition to reposition itself as a continental energy supplier is no longer a policy aspiration — it is now producing measurable results on the water.
The Nigerian Ports Authority (NPA) has revealed that it coordinated the export of more than 500,000 tonnes of petroleum products from the Dangote Refinery to African markets in the month of March alone, marking what the authority describes as a pivotal demonstration of the country’s growing capacity as a regional energy hub.
The disclosure came from NPA Managing Director, Dr Abubakar Dantsoho, during a high-level stakeholders’ engagement hosted by the Federal Ministry of Marine and Blue Economy in Lagos. For an industry long accustomed to bad news on indigenous capacity, the figures were striking.
“As a matter of fact, in the past month, we exported over 500,000 tonnes of petroleum products from Dangote Refinery to African countries. The exports are handled by ships, supported by the NPA’s capacity in port and cargo operations,” Dantsoho told the gathering.
What makes the achievement especially significant is its timing. Global vessel movements have been severely disrupted by the ongoing tensions across the Middle East, rattling supply chains and triggering energy shortages in several countries. Yet Nigeria’s domestic and export petroleum corridors held firm — a contrast Dantsoho was quick to draw.
At the heart of the operation is a One-Stop-Shop (OSS) framework deployed at the Dangote Refinery terminal, introduced at the direction of Minister of Marine and Blue Economy, Dr Adegboyega Oyetola. The system functions much like the National Single Window initiative at the nation’s ports, drawing all government agencies and private terminal operators into a single, coordinated workflow.
“This system operates similarly to the National Single Window, ensuring efficiency and coordination,” Dantsoho said, noting that all stakeholders now operate in sync with the refinery’s distribution architecture.
The statement was released through the NPA’s General Manager for Corporate Communications and Strategy, Mr Ikechukwu Onyemekara.
For Nigeria’s maritime sector, the March figures carry deeper significance. They represent a tangible step in the country’s long-stated ambition to transition from a net importer of refined petroleum to a net exporter — and they signal that the port infrastructure and maritime logistics necessary to sustain that transition are beginning to come online.
The question now is whether the momentum can be sustained and scaled.
NIGERIA WATCH
A Waterways News monitor of maritime developments across Africa and their implications for Nigeria
Djibouti Opens East Africa’s Largest Shipyard — And Nigeria Should Be Paying Close Attention
While Nigeria’s ports are celebrating export milestones, a critical piece of maritime infrastructure has just been unveiled less than 3,000 kilometres away — and its implications for Africa’s ship repair landscape are hard to ignore.
Djibouti has officially inaugurated the Djibouti Ship Repair Yard (DSRY), built in partnership with the globally respected Damen Shipyards Group and financed to the tune of $120 million by Invest International. According to the Djibouti Ports and Free Zones Authority, the facility is now the largest ship repair yard across the Red Sea and East Africa combined.
The centrepiece of the complex is a floating dock stretching 217 metres in length and 43 metres in width, capable of lifting vessels weighing up to 20,100 tonnes. The yard is designed to handle everything from routine preventive maintenance to complex corrective repairs, blending international technical expertise with local workforce development.
President Ismail Omar Guelleh, speaking at the inauguration, described the shipyard as a long-standing national priority, anchored in Djibouti’s enviable geographic position at the mouth of the Bab el-Mandeb Strait — one of the planet’s most transited maritime corridors. The project feeds directly into the country’s Vision 2035 agenda, which aims to entrench Djibouti as the dominant maritime hub of East Africa.
For Nigeria, the message embedded in this development should not be lost. West Africa’s largest economy — home to the Gulf of Guinea, Africa’s most active oil-producing waters and a coastline that handles billions of dollars in cargo annually — continues to lag woefully in ship repair and dry-docking infrastructure. Nigerian-flagged and Nigeria-trading vessels routinely travel to yards in Europe, Asia, and now increasingly East Africa, to carry out maintenance that could and should be performed at home.
The Cabotage Vessel Financing Fund (CVFF), recently reactivated with over 60 applications received, and the Coastal and Inland Shipping (Cabotage) Act are existing frameworks that could anchor a dedicated push toward ship repair infrastructure development. But frameworks alone do not build floating docks.
Djibouti’s $120 million wager on ship repair capacity — backed by an international development finance institution and a world-class shipbuilding partner — offers Nigeria a workable template. The combination of sovereign vision, development finance, and private sector expertise is achievable. What is required is the political will and institutional focus to pursue it.
As Nigeria consolidates its new identity as a petroleum export nation, the vessels doing that work must one day be built, maintained, and repaired in Nigerian waters. Djibouti is not waiting for Nigeria to figure that out.
Waterways News | Covering Nigeria’s waterways, blue economy, and maritime trade.
Oyetola Woos Turkish Investors for Fisheries Sector, Vows to Protect Artisanal Fishers
By Okeoghene Onoriobe | Waterways News
The Minister of Marine and Blue Economy, Dr Adegboyega Oyetola, has thrown Nigeria’s fisheries sector open to Turkish investment, insisting that any fresh capital coming into the industry must strengthen and not sideline the millions of Nigerians who depend on artisanal fishing for a living.
Oyetola made the pledge while receiving a delegation from Turkish fisheries and aquaculture firm CRD Impex, led by the company’s General Manager for Fisheries, Cem Tarhan, at his Abuja office. He told the investors the Federal Government was ready to create an investment-friendly climate for credible local and foreign players willing to bring capital, technology and modern value-chain solutions to the sector, on condition that such investment remains inclusive.
“We welcome investors who can bring capital, technology, expertise and modern value-chain solutions to the sector. However, investment must be inclusive and sustainable. It must complement and empower our artisanal fish producers, not undermine their livelihoods,” the Minister said
He listed inadequate infrastructure, poor access to modern fishing technology, weak cold-chain systems, limited processing and storage capacity, and gaps in market access as the major constraints holding back the sector, framing each as an opening for targeted investment rather than a dead end.
The Turkish team, which included CRD Impex founder Hanefi Cardak and Tetra Underwater Services founder Ersun Buyukgoze, toured key fisheries and aquaculture points around the country to size up the terrain first-hand. Stops included the Kirikiri Lighter Terminal in Lagos, the Ozumba Mbadiwe Fish Market in Lekki, and the Esuk Nsidung Beach Market, a major waterfront seafood hub in Calabar, Cross River State.
The Ministry described the visit as part of a broader push to attract serious investment into Nigeria’s blue economy while keeping the welfare of artisanal fishers central to that growth.
Nigeria Watch
The Turkish courtesy call lands squarely in the pattern this desk has tracked all year: big-ticket investment pledges for Nigeria’s waterways, paired with familiar assurances that the small operator won’t be crowded out. The test, as always, is what happens after the photo-op.
Nigeria’s artisanal fishing communities occupy the same economic space as the informal boat operators represented by WABOTAN and ATBOWATON, river- and creek-dependent Nigerians whose livelihoods rise or fall on decisions made far from the waterfront. The infrastructure gaps Oyetola cited which include, weak cold-chain systems, poor storage and limited market access, all mirror the exact complaints this desk has documented from inland waterway operators for years but modernisation announced from Abuja rarely reache the jetties.
Turkish capital chasing Nigerian fisheries and aquaculture is a genuinely new thread, distinct from the Strait of Hormuz shipping story or the CVFF disbursement saga this desk has followed closely. But the underlying question is the same one that has defined Oyetola’s tenure at the Ministry of Marine and Blue Economy: will “inclusive investment” translate into contracts, cooperative partnerships and cold-chain infrastructure that artisanal operators can actually use or will it, like so many blue-economy pledges before it, stall at the courtesy-visit stage?
Waterways News will be watching for the first concrete CRD Impex commitment — site, timeline, or local partnership — as the marker of whether this one is different.
NPERA, NPA Open Technical Talks on Handover of Inland Dry Port Functions
By Ighoyota Onaibre | Waterways News
The Nigerian Ports Economic Regulatory Agency (NPERA) and the Nigerian Ports Authority (NPA) have begun formal engagement on transferring inland dry port oversight to NPERA, marking the start of what both agencies describe as a critical phase in operationalising Nigeria’s new port regulatory framework.
At a management-level meeting between the two agencies, officials focused on the technical groundwork for the handover, chiefly how to draw clear lines of responsibility and avoid duplication among the government bodies with a stake in inland dry port administration.
NPERA’s Director-General/CEO, Dr Akutah Pius, framed the transition as flowing directly from the Minister of Marine and Blue Economy, Dr Adegboyega Oyetola, whom he credited with steering the process toward the sector’s broader development. Akutah was emphatic that NPERA could not carry out the transfer alone, and said the buy-in of every relevant stakeholder agency would be needed to see it through.
He indicated that the Ministry would stay central to coordinating the process even as specific mandates move to the agencies best placed to execute them. Akutah also pointed to the Minister’s earlier interventions during the NPERA Bill’s passage through the National Assembly, which he said had defused inter-agency friction and set the stage for the cooperation now underway.
Describing the purpose of the meeting, Akutah said it was meant to formally kick off the transfer of inland dry port responsibilities to NPERA in fulfilment of its statutory role as economic regulator of the ports sector. He singled out Section 51 of the NPERA Act as a provision that now needs to be put into practical effect to keep the transition orderly and ensure stakeholder roles are properly aligned.
To manage the process going forward, the NPERA boss proposed setting up a joint committee drawing in NPERA, NPA, the National Inland Waterways Authority (NIWA), and the Federal Ministry of Marine and Blue Economy. He argued that inland dry ports matter well beyond the coastline. They extend maritime sector benefits into Nigeria’s hinterland and reinforce the country’s trade and logistics chain.
Responding on behalf of NPA, Managing Director Dr Abubakar Dantsoho welcomed the move and pledged his agency’s full operational and technical backing throughout the transition. He said the process had started on the right footing, and that NPA would furnish updated data on the current state of inland dry ports to inform further discussions, expressing confidence that continued engagement would help the agencies meet their shared objectives.
NPA’s Executive Director, Engr. Lekan Badmus, also commended NPERA for setting the collaboration in motion, calling the meeting a solid first step toward a smooth integration. He noted the two agencies have now moved into the technical phase of the exercise, with close attention being paid to eliminating overlapping functions.
Closing the meeting, Akutah said the proposed joint committee would reconvene with the Minister to seek further guidance and agree on next steps to keep the transition on track.
Nigeria Watch
This meeting is the first visible test of whether the NPERA Act’s promise of a rationalised port regulatory architecture can survive contact with Nigeria’s crowded agency landscape. Section 51’s transfer of inland dry port functions to NPERA looks straightforward on paper; in practice, it touches NPA’s traditional port administration turf, NIWA’s inland waterways mandate, and the Ministry’s coordinating role all at once, precisely the kind of overlapping jurisdiction that has bedevilled reform efforts elsewhere in the sector, most visibly in the long-running NIWA-LASWA tussle that only the Supreme Court could settle.
The proposed joint committee of NPERA, NPA, NIWA, and the Ministry, is a sensible mechanism, but Waterways News readers who have followed the CVFF disbursement saga know that Nigerian maritime governance has no shortage of well-designed committees whose outputs never quite reach implementation. What will matter is whether Akutah’s “technical phase” produces a binding timeline, not another round of goodwill statements.
For inland dry port operators and the hinterland trade corridors that depend on them, the stakes are practical: unclear jurisdiction between NPA and NPERA has historically meant slower cargo evacuation, duplicated levies, and uncertainty for freight forwarders planning routes away from the congested Lagos ports. If this transition is handled well, it strengthens the case for dry ports as genuine pressure valves for Apapa and Tin Can. If it stalls in inter-agency turf negotiation, it becomes one more entry in the gap between policy pronouncement and delivery that this desk continues to track.
Worth watching: whether Minister Oyetola’s office sets an explicit deadline when the committee reconvenes, and whether NIWA, whose inland waterways mandate intersects with dry port hinterland connectivity, gets more than a seat at the table.
Two More Tankers Struck in Strait of Hormuz as Attack Count Hits Five in a Week
By Okeoghene Onoriobe | Waterways News
Two more tankers have been hit while transiting the Strait of Hormuz, leaving two seafarers with minor injuries and pushing the number of reported attacks or security incidents against commercial vessels in the waterway to at least five since 16 September.
The UK Maritime Trade Operations (UKMTO) centre said an inbound tanker was struck by an unidentified projectile on Monday. Two crew members sustained minor injuries, but the vessel stayed under its own power and continued to its next port, with no environmental impact reported.
Hours later, UKMTO issued a second alert after an outbound LPG tanker reported being struck by debris from unknown projectiles. All crew were reported safe and the vessel also continued its voyage. Authorities are investigating both incidents, and UKMTO has not attributed either attack to a specific actor.
The two strikes build on a Joint Maritime Information Center (JMIC) advisory covering three earlier attacks between 16 and 18 September, one of which saw a tanker’s hull breached by a projectile, sparking a fire. JMIC continues to rate the threat level in the strait as “severe,” citing a high likelihood of deliberate hostile action and pointing to a pattern of harassment by Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps — drone overflights, surveillance of merchant vessels and VHF hailing, alongside the direct attacks.
Traffic through the chokepoint remains sharply depressed. Only 17 commodity vessels were visibly transiting over the weekend, down from 37 the week before and against a pre-war daily average of roughly 125. That figure excludes vessels sailing with their AIS transponders switched off, and JMIC notes a persistent gap between visible and actual traffic.
Nigeria Watch
For Nigerian maritime stakeholders, the Hormuz crisis is no longer a distant Gulf story. It is a cost line. Every fresh escalation feeds directly into the war-risk insurance premiums and freight rates that Nigerian importers, refiners and shipping agents ultimately absorb, since global tanker and container capacity pulled off the Hormuz route tightens supply elsewhere and pushes rates up across long-haul trades, including those serving West African ports.
The renewed attacks also sharpen the stakes around Nigeria’s push for a stronger voice at the IMO Council table and its broader blue-economy diplomacy under Minister Adegboyega Oyetola. A sustained Gulf disruption is exactly the kind of systemic shock that tests whether Nigeria’s seat translates into influence over how global shipping risk, insurance and rerouting decisions are made, rather than Nigeria simply absorbing the downstream cost.
Locally, the episode is a reminder of the layered nature of “maritime security” as a policy word: the Deep Blue Project and Gulf of Guinea security architecture address piracy and armed robbery close to home, but Nigeria’s ports and shippers remain exposed to security failures thousands of kilometres away in the Gulf.
Waterways News will continue tracking how the Hormuz situation feeds into freight cost pressure at Nigerian ports and NIMASA’s public messaging on the issue.
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