The Supreme Court has declared that the powers, right and authority to control activities on the nation’s inland waterways belonged exclusively to the federal government of Nigeria.
The declaration made on Friday, has rested the nearly 12 years legal battle between the federal government and the Lagos State Government over the right of control on inland waterways in the country.
The declaration was made while delivering judgment in the appeal marked: SC/CV/17/2018, and filed by the National Inland Waterways Authority, (NIWA), Nigerian Maritime Standard and Safety Agency NIMASSA), the Minister of Mines and Steel Development, and the Minister of Transport.
In the judgment prepared by Justice John Okoro but read by Justice Emmanuel Agim, the apex court held that it was wrong, unlawful and illegal for states to seek to control the sector and impose levies on businesses operating in the nation’s inland waterways.
According to the apex court, the 1999 Constitution as amended, gives exclusive control of activities in the nation’s inland waterways to the Federal Government of Nigeria through its agencies, that were the appellants in the suit
The appellants through their team of lawyers led by Lateef Fagbemi, SAN, the Attorney-General of the Federation (AGF) and Minister of Justice, had in 2018 approached the apex court to challenge the judgment of the Court of Appeal, which had held that the right of control belonged to the states.
NIWA, in urging the Supreme Court to set aside the judgment of the appellate court contended that the Lagos lagoon and Lekki lagoons were exclusively within its control, contrary to the claims of Lagos State.
Besides, the agency prayed the apex court to declare that the licensing, collection of levies and control of all inland waterways spanning more than 10,000 kilometres in the country was the exclusive reserve of the federal government and not that of the states.
Delivering judgment in the appeal nearly six years after, the apex court held that NIWA is the only agency saddled with the responsibility to levy, impose, and charge rates of utilisation along the declared waters of the Nigerian Inland Waterways Authority.
Justice Agim stated that NIWA was the rightful and legal agency of the federal government with the powers to exclusively manage, direct and control all activities on the navigable waters and its right of way throughout the country for inland navigation, pursuant to Sections 8 and 9 of NIWA Act.
The apex court further upheld Fagbemi’s submission that the activities of the Lagos government and its agencies constituted a flagrant usurpation and an illegal encroachment on the statutory functions of NIWA, on the grounds that the waterways of Lagos State, among others in Nigeria, fall under the Exclusive Legislative List set out in Part 1 of the Second Schedule to the 1999 Constitution.
The apex court maintained that it was only the federal government, through the National Assembly, that could validly legislate on Maritime Shipping and Navigation, adding that the power to legislate on any subject in the Exclusive Legislative List did not lie with the Lagos State Government.
