Members
of House of Representatives have been left with eggs on their faces after the
majority shareholder of maritime logistics company, Intels Nigeria Limited,
Gabriele Volpi, apologised to the Nigerian Ports Authority (NPA) and the
Nigeria government over the crisis that led to termination of the company’s
pilotage agreement.
The
House of Representatives had on Wednesday urged the government to reverse the
termination of the pilotage contract, even before an investigation.
The
lower legislative body also set up an ad hoc committee to investigate the
legality of the termination of the contract.
The
resolution followed a motion raised under matters of urgent public importance
by Diri Duoye, Bayelsa-PDP. Mr Duoye said said the termination of the contract
will lead to the loss of thousands of jobs.
“About
7000 Nigerians work for INTELS and terminating the contract will have negative
effects on local content & will lead to unemployment.”
He
was supported by Ekpo Attah, Akwa-Ibom-PDP, who said the motion is important
and “status quo” should be maintained.
“Intels
employs a lot of people. I submit that this motion is very pertinent and Intels
should be returned.”
However,
in an interview with ThisDay newspaper, Mr Volpi who co-founded Intels with
former vice president, Atiku Abubakar, extended an olive branch.
He
explained that he was not involved in the botched negotiation between Intels
and the NPA and pledged that his company would transfer all the revenue
collected from the boat monitoring and supervision services to the Treasury Single
Account (TSA) as the NPA had demanded.
“We
want to apologise to the federal government and NPA over this disagreement with
Intels. I was not personally involved in the negotiations with NPA, but we
apologise for what has happened.
“We
intend to comply with the directive of government and transfer all the revenue
to the TSA because we are a law-abiding company,” Mr. Volpi was quoted as
saying.
He
said Intels will cooperate with the federal government and the NPA in the
development of Nigeria’s maritime sector, including the construction of the Badagry
deep seaport in Lagos State.
Following
the revocation of its pilotage contract, Intels had threatened to walk away
from its multi-billion dollars investment at the Badagry deep seaport in Lagos.
“We
are committed to co-operating with the government and NPA in the development of
Nigeria’s maritime sector and this includes the Badagry deep seaport.
“The
Badagry deep seaport is a massive undertaking which will cost billions of
dollars and will be the biggest in Africa and would turn Nigeria into a
regional hub for ships bringing goods to the continent.
“It
will also help to move a lot of shipping activities at the Apapa and Tin-can
Island ports and help to decongest Apapa, so we are serious about our
investments in Nigeria,” Mr. Volpi said.
The
NPA said they relied on advice from the Attorney General of the Federation,
AGF, and Minister of Justice, Abubakar Malami, to terminate the contract.
Intels
has earlier, faulted the termination, saying it would challenge it in court.
Source: premiumtimesng
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