The Nigerian Maritime Administration and Safety Agency ( NIMASA) said it has detained four vessels over non- compliance with cabotage regulations following a targeted enforcement operation in the Lagos maritime domain.
The vessels identified as MT Holmes, MT Fujairah Energy, JS Gratitude, MT Bora, were arrested and detained during Operation Sea Guardian, an enforcement initiative aimed at strengthening compliance with maritime regulations in Nigeria waters.
NIMASA said in a statement that some of the vessels had since been released after regularising their infractions.
The agency said the operation was conducted as a follow-up enforcement to verify compliance with cabotage obligations, assessing surcharge and levy compliance, and ensuring adherence to applicable maritime regulations.
According to NIMASA, the exercise involved the deployment of the Deep Blue assets to help track, board, inspect, and verify the operational status of vessels identified through intelligence reports and compliance indicators through effective inter-agency cooperation among NIMASA enforcement personnel, the Nigerian Navy, the Maritime Guard Command and C4i intelligence personnel.
“Through this intelligence-driven process, vessels assessed as having a high likelihood of defaulting on cabotage obligations were identified and prioritized for further scrutiny.
“These vessels were subsequently incorporated into a broader Target Bank that had been established during the first enforcement operation. The updated Target Bank provides a consolidated repository of vessels of interest and serves as the primary reference for planning and executing the enforcement activities, ensuring that operational resources were focused on high-risk targets, ” the statement said.
Reacting to the development, the Director General of NIMASA, Dr. Dayo Mobereola emphasised that such operations are going to be more frequent and that defaulting operators would face the full wrath of the law.
According to him, “we had earlier served notice of enhanced enforcement of indigenous participation in our coastal and inland trade and this is exactly what we are doing. It is therefore in the interest of operators to ensure total compliance because defaulters will be visited with stiff sanctions in line with the law”.
It will be recalled that NIMASA had on August 26, 2026 issued a marine notice pursuant to its statutory mandate to promote the development of indigenous capacity in international and coastal shipping trade to concerned stakeholders clearly restating the conditions for engaging in Cabotage trade and warned that “any vessel, company, operator, charterer or other stakeholder found to be in breach of the Cabotage Act or any other applicable Cabotage requirement shall be subject to appropriate enforcement action by the Agency in accordance with the law, without further recourse to violators”.
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