Nigeria Moves to Unlock Cabotage Ship Fund
Nigeria’s government has ordered a faster release of the Cabotage Vessel Financing Fund, a 2003 facility that officials say now holds about $700 million and has yet to put that money into the hands of Nigerian shipowners.
Marine and Blue Economy Minister Adegboyega Oyetola said yesterday via X, that President Bola Tinubu had authorised disbursement and that qualified operators may borrow up to $25 million each at 6.5 percent over eight years to buy vessels for coastal and offshore work still dominated by foreign fleets. The fund was built from a 2 percent levy under the Coastal and Inland Shipping Act, which reserved parts of domestic trade for Nigerian-owned ships. For more than twenty years the cash sat unused through changes of government, fights over who could apply and delays at the agencies that were supposed to lend it.
Oyetola told the Nigerian Maritime Administration and Safety Agency to work with twelve approved banks, up from five. A portal opened in Lagos on 22 January. NIMASA has 92 applications; twenty have gone to the banks and one has cleared review for final approval. Under the present split NIMASA provides 70 percent of each loan, the borrower at least 15 percent equity and the bank the rest.
According to the minister, a larger local fleet could support more than 30,000 jobs in yards, engineering, maintenance and logistics and keep more freight earnings from Nigerian waters at home. He also listed training numbers from ministry scorecards: 222 seafarers given free professional courses, 333 cadets with degrees, 135 Nigerian Seafarers Development Programme cadets with Certificates of Competency and 7,059 seafarers placed for sea time.
Earlier clocks have run down without cheques and though the portal was sold as a 70-to-90-day path to money; by mid-2026 no confirmed payouts had been announced. Shipping groups say audited accounts, existing contracts and bankable studies shut out many smaller firms. Whether this directive produces the first closed loans will decide if the fund is finally a tool or another file in a long local-content story.
