... NIMASA said they don't have money, we should go borrow - Cadets
Harboursandport.com: Lagos - The Nigerian Maritime Administration and Satefy Agency (NIMASA) has abandoned 35 of its cadets send to the Phillipines under the National Seafarers Development Programme (NSDP) to their fate, with most of them now living from hand to mouth.
Harboursandport.com gathered that the cadets have been trying to reach out to NIMASA in the last few weeks to inform them of their condition but that officials of the agency have refused to respond to their many calls.
A source close to the cadets who spoke to Harboursandport.com said they were initially 21 cadets under the Lerus Maritime Agency sent to Ukraine from where they were sent to the Phillipines after their one year seatime to prepare for their exams.
The source explained that despite their condition, NIMASA on Monday still sent additional 14 cadets to join them in the Phillipines.
On getting information that additional 14 cadets were to be sent over, they got in touch with their colleagues to contact NIMASA to inform them of the condition that they were passing through, the source explained.
The source said to the surprise of their colleagues who met with one Yetinde Collins that told them that NIMASA has no money; advising them to go and borrow until money is available.
One of the cadets that just arrived actually contemplated returning back to Nigeria after witnessing the condition of other colleagues who were preparing for their exams, the source explained.
One of the cadets in a correspondence with Harboursandport.com said, "Pls we have been trying to reach the Director-General directly without passing the NSDP. The NIMASA NSDP signed and MoU with the Lerus maritime Agency Ukraine to help train some of her cadets on seatime trainings and towards achieving the Certificate of Competency, CoC.
"After completing the one year seatime programe at sea, the Lerus is still in charge of her assigned number of cadets, same as NIMASA.
"Now coming to the Philippines, though I may not know in details the content of the MoU, but all expenses to acquire visa processing and other traveling requirements was on us the Lerus group, on the other hand, NIMASA has paid for her cadets visa fees and other traveling requirements, and reimburse them on every other expenses which they incurred.
"Now to summarize the whole issue here, the Lerus Gave her cadets which are now in second batch the sum of $800 to $1104 respectively for their feeding, for the duration of the four to five months preparatory classes towards achieving the sole aim of the CoC.
"They booked a bed spaced dormitory for eight cadets per room which is not comfortable and tightly packed. Due to the nature of the abode, it's unfit and unconducive to study and prepare for such a high standard exam,as there are no study tables nor chairs. We take online classes due to pandemic, most time while laying on the bed.
"We feed cautiously from the money given to us as no assurance of any other coming from the Lerus agency, we subscribed the internet to meet up classes, we transport ourselves to and fro the practical training centers.
"We tend to be more careful and economical in all we do, sometimes we walk the distance from our training center to our dormitory just so we don't over spend, yet we can't manage as the money is too young coupled with the current inflation of commodities here in the Philippines, we skip breakfast and lunch everyday just so we manage the stipends.
"On the other hand, Nimasa gave her cadet $6500 for the duration of the same period of this programme, they stay in their desired places, and are far more comfortable compare to the Lerus group.
"All efforts to address this issues with the Lerus management landed on empty drums, as the response from him sometime ago was "Fuck u and fuck NIMASA". We are now trying to send a direct message to the DG NIMASA, without the NSDP department but we are finding it difficult.
"Our visas will soon be out of date, we only have 59 days. Right now we intend going to the embassy to inform them of the current situations. Of which our first batch is already out on the 9 of June 2022, we don't have money to extend.
"Please sir, the situation here is so negative on our academics such that we are beginning to loss interest in learning, we may run out of patients and be discourage of the entire program, here in the Philippines.
"We were initially not allowed to cook in the dormitory despite the availability of cooking facilities, rather we were asked to pay a thousand pesos each before we would be allowed, hence this facilitate the eating outside in eateries and the local kitchen, untill recently due to sympathy from the dormitory management, we were permission to use the cooking stuffs after much begging.
Efforts to reach the DG NIMASA, Dr. Bashir Jamoh proved abortive as he neither picked his calls nor responded to text message, WhatsApp message sent to him.
.jpg)
No comments:
Post a Comment