The Nigerian Ports Authority (NPA) has called for increased private sector investment in port infrastructure following the exhaustion of the capacity of Lekki Deep Sea Port barely three years after its commissioning.
The Managing Director of NPA, Dr Abubakar Dantsoho, made the call while addressing maritime investors at the ongoing World Ports Conference in London, where he identified Nigeria’s growing population, urbanisation and infrastructure gaps as opportunities for investment in the maritime sector.
Dantsoho said the increasing volume of cargo handled by the ports required additional capacity to accommodate bigger vessels and higher volumes of imports and exports.
He noted that government alone could not finance the development of bigger and deeper seaports, urging investors to take advantage of the opportunities across Nigeria and other African countries.
“Nigeria at independence in 1960 had a population of 45 million people. Today, about 60 years later, there are more than 260 million people. The investment needed in ports to meet this expansion and growth can only happen if the requisite private investment is attracted and retained,” he said.
The NPA boss said the country had identified infrastructure gaps in its ports and recognised the need to increase capacity to receive bigger vessels and move more cargo for export.
He added that port infrastructure development was capital-intensive, making private investment necessary to accelerate expansion across the continent.
“So, the governments in both West Africa and generally in Africa have realized that the government cannot fund development of bigger or deeper sea ports, hence the need for your investment to move speedily into Africa,” he said.
Dantsoho cited Lekki Deep Sea Port in Lagos as an example of the growing demand for port capacity, saying the facility, commissioned about three years ago, had already exhausted its capacity.
He said the port was built at a cost of $1.6 billion with funding from the Chinese government in partnership with China Harbour.
“But as of today, just about 3 years later, the capacity of the new deep-sea port that is Lekki has been exhausted. So, which means that clearly, we need more capacity to be able to contain the volumes,” he said.
Dantsoho said the increase in cargo volumes was also contributing to the NPA’s revenue.
“And for us as Port Authority, we are happy that we are capturing more of the cargo, the volumes are going up, because that is the only way that we can also increase our value, the revenue that we expect to make from these transactions,” he said.
He also identified Nigeria as the major destination for cargo entering the West African market, citing its population in comparison with neighbouring countries.
According to him, Ghana has a population of 34 million, Côte d’Ivoire 32 million, Togo nine million and Benin Republic 14 million, while Nigeria has more than 260 million people.
He said the population difference meant that most cargoes arriving in the subregion, particularly from China, eventually entered the Nigerian market.
