The Lagos State Waterways Authority (LASWA), on Monday, disclosed that the Lagos State Government would soon introduce electric boats into the State’s inland waterways.
This was disclosed by the general manager, LASWA, Damilola Emmanuel, when he hosted a delegation from MOWCA and Interferry on a facility tour of Lagos State waterways assets
The LASWA GM, however, allayed fears of boat owners and operators, saying the electric ferries won’t phase out the current petrol boats but would work side by side with the existing boats.
Emmanuel, who also hosted members of the Transportation Correspondents Association of Nigeria (TCAN) on the sidelines of the facility tour, stated that ferry safety is very important to inland waterways operations.
“Under the Omi-Eko project, in a few years, we will be bringing in electric boats.
It’s a project that seeks to basically revolutionise water transportation in Lagos with the introduction of electric ferries, upgrading of the existing jetties and terminals, dredging of the inland waterways, and capacity building for LASWA.
“The electric ferries won’t phase out the current petrol boats. It will work side by side with the existing boats. That is why we’ve encouraged the informal sector to go and form cooperatives so that it will be easy for the government to support them.”
LASWA also disclosed plans to join the Maritime Organisation of West and Central Africa (MOWCA) and Interferry Association, and has moved to improve safety on Lagos waterways through collaboration and knowledge sharing.
“As you know, we’ve enjoyed safety over the inland waterways in Lagos State. We want to continue to improve upon safety, knowing full well that we’re going to be doing this with international partners who can come in and share knowledge with us and tell us exactly how to improve our safety practices.
“Interferry is an international safety body that promotes ferry safety from Europe to America, to Asia and to Africa. They’re a big ferry safety body and they’ve been doing this all over the world.
“They have not been to West Africa before now, and felt they needed to come down to also come and have a ferry safety conference over here.”
Also speaking, the chief executive officer of Interferry, Mike Corrigan explained that his company has come with 12 safety experts to help LASWA improve its safety operations.
“I have a team here of about 12 experts in various safety matters from navigation to safe operation of vessels, to life-saving, to all phases of safety. So what we want to do is to be able to tell LASWA what we’ve learned and offer our guidance and assistance.
“LASWA is now a member of Interferry. Interferry is a worldwide ferry trade association that represents the ferry industry around the world with almost 300 members. We have a great opportunity to be able to share and learn on both sides.
“For now, Lagos is the only African city we have this with. However, we want to come to Africa more often to be able to help improve the waterways in Africa.
“We’ve had a couple of conferences now. This will be our third conference and we hope to come back and offer our services to anybody who would like to participate with Interferry.”
