Lagos — All the seaports in Nigeria could function optimally if the federal government restructures the ports along specialised imports, Manager, Calabar Free Port, Ahmed Dandare, has advised.

If government adopts this arrangement, where specific ports would handle specific types of cargoes, business activities in other ports outside Lagos, like Calabar and Warri would receive a boost.

Dandare disclosed this while conducting maritime journalists round the Calabar port's facilities, adding that such an arrangement could make Apapa port handle containers, Tin-Can Island port would handle general cargoes and Calabar port would handle other bulk cargoes.

The port manager was speaking against the backdrop of calls for the dredging of Calabar port, which has been experiencing low activities over the years because large vessels cannot berth due to shallow draft of the channel, which is about 6.5 meters at high tide instead of up to 11 meters.

To make the Calabar port vibrant once again, Dandare said the restructuring along specialised imports is a viable option, because once adopted, importers would have no alternative than to patronise the specialised ports and bring their cargoes through the port designated to handle such a consignment.

"Once the idea is accepted, whether an importer likes it or not, he has to take his cargo to the designated port," Dandare said, adding that even though dredging could boost activities at the Calabar port, it is just one factor out of several problems militating against optimal functioning of the port.

He recalled that Maersk Line, a leading shipping company left the port in November 2008 because the cargoes being handled by the company drastically reduced from 350 containers per month to less than a hundred.

Beyond dredging the port, Dandare said other factors like good access roads to and from the ports should be addressed, saying no importer would want to bring his goods as the container would fall off the trucks as a result of bad roads.

He also said that it was a nightmare passing through the bad roads from Calabar to Aba and the Northern parts of the country, lamenting that there is only a single road entering the city, adding that the road, apart from being too narrow, is also bad in shape.

He appealed for the dualisation of the access road to Calabar and from Calabar up North East.

According to the port manager, the only succour was the upsurge in volume of petroleum products passing through the port, saying that the port is handling more of the petroleum products cargoes than the bulk cargoes, adding that, "I foresee a situation where calabar port area would be a hub for oil and gas business."

He said government has approved two oil jetties presently under construction within the Calabar Free Trade Zone, and that by the time the jetties are constructed, the volume of petroleum products passing through port would be higher.