By Bazee Uloh
July 16, 2022 will remain a dark day for several marine transport passengers who were travelling from Calabar to Oron. But it will also remain a day to remember and be grateful to God that though the bad happened, the worst did not.
It was a day their journey from Ayade’s state capital almost ended as the day they would have bid farewell to mother Earth.
The journey from one of the jetties in Calabar started on a happy note, and the travellers had their hopes set on landing safely at the other end of their journey: Oron beach. But something kinky unexpectedly kicked in, minutes after they left the shores of Calabar.
According to one of the female victims of the pirate attack, they were swooped on by some violence-vending criminals, who stormed the boat, seized the driver and all the male passengers, and left the three female passengers behind, marooned, so to speak, on a tiny creek.
Fortunately, one of the female passengers did a video using her cell phone, and posted it online.
This is what, in a tearful, frightful voice, she managed to say in the video, “Please, if you guys are seeing this video on my status, we need help. Just raise an alarm. I am going for a wedding in Akwa Ibom, when we were robbed. The gunmen came and took all the men (male passengers) including the boat driver.”
Continuing, she said, “We are just here with a reverend sister, as well as other ladies. Please, we need help. We are across the sea. We don’t know where we are. We are at the first branch from the pick-up point.”
What the traumatized passengers went through is better imagined than experienced. It was a horrible, hard-to-forget experience to be left that way inside a boat in the middle of nowhere. It’s almost certain that the victims could not row that boat, and even if they could, could they be sure of where to go from where they were abandoned? Thanks Providence that the hoodlums left them with their phones inside a tiny creek, where the water current was benign.
As soon as the video hit the Internet, Nigerians in their numbers reacted with sympathy, calling on relevant authorities to step in and rescue the victims. And quite appreciatively, the Navy and Marine Police hit the waters, sailing fast, and were able to trace where the victims were abandoned, and rescued them. Nigerians will eternally be grateful to God and to the security officers, who went to rescue those victims.
It must be noted emphatically that some of the victims of piracy along Nigerian waterways have not been that lucky. Many have been raped, and not a few murdered, and their bodies dumped in the marshes of the mangrove groves around.
As this is being written, nothing seems to have been heard about the male passengers who were kidnapped on that fateful day.
In fact, there have been numerous reports of passengers and traders plying the Oron-Cameroon route, which is an extension of the Gulf of Guinea, with a coastline of 6000 kilometres, being attacked by pirates, some of who are said to be locals.
With the Ibom Deep Seaport, part-sponsored by the Akwa Ibom State government, piracy is likely to increase along the Akwa Ibom and Cross River waterways. What should be the response of government and law-abiding citizens?
Fortunately, the governor of Akwa Ibom, Mr. Udom Emmanuel, seems to envisage this, and has initiated proactive measures to respond to the likelihood of such criminal activities. Recently, the governor donated additional 13 gunboats to the Police in the state to maintain marine safety and security. That number was added to five, which he had earlier on donated, and has promised to do more.
While receiving the new police commissioner, Mr. OlatoyeDurosinmi, posted to the state last month, Emmanuel said, “Let me thank you for your special interest in marine security.” The implication of that was simple: as far as maritime security is concerned, you can trust me as a solid ally.”
Emmanuel went on, “I am aware of the tools that you need. We have tried our possible best to supply the gunboats and new engines, and in the past two weeks, we’ve acquired a lot. We hadbought five earlier; you said they were not enough. We added 13, making it 18 gunboats in these few months.”
The governor added, “We will continue to improve on that, and I am sure you have seen that we have improved a lot on communication equipment. I believe if it is properly deplored, it will help us a whole lot.”
What could have happened to those hapless, stranded Nigerians, whose only crime was to want to travel in peace from one point of the country to another, but were halted and harassed by those criminals, if there were no gunboats or other equipment available to the police at the time?
It is encouraging to see the synergy between the Akwa Ibom State government and the police. The people of the state need to buy into this by volunteering credible information to the police to help keep our waterways, its international trade value, and aqua life safe.
On their part, the police in the state should seek and obtain collaboration with their colleagues in neighbouring states as well as seek the cooperation of our fluvial communities to help them operate proactively to prevent crimes on our waterways. A safe marine life is crucial to the well-being, the economy and health of our people.
Discussion about this post