Marina hit for ‘misplaced’ safety measures

A major seafarers’ group has scored the Maritime Industry Authority (Marina) for the agency’s failure to plug loopholes in maritime safety enforcement in the Philippines, saying that most of the memorandums it has issued  were meant to put the blame for the disasters on others.

United Filipino Seafarers (UFS) President Engineer Nelson Ramirez said over the weekend that the series of memorandum circulars issued by Marina Administrator Ma. Elena Bautista are “misplaced” solutions to the problem of maritime safety in the country.

“Tough, sweeping and bold, the memorandum circulars, which were supposedly to plug the loopholes in the maritime safety enforcement, were done post-haste and without proper consultations with the concerned maritime stakeholders,” Ramirez said.

“It was also done haphazardly that it would appear that those were meant more to [place] the blame on the series of maritime disasters on somebody else,” the UFS president added.

One of the problems that Martinez cited was the memo circular requiring all shipowners to replace immediately the lifejackets on board their vessels.

Ramirez said: “Instead of simply coming out with an MC on lifejackets, Marina should conduct an actual inspection of lifejackets onboard vessels, and not at its offices. Some shipowners may present lifejackets that conform to the standards in the offices of Marina but actually do not install them onboard their vessels, so the maritime agency should have regular actual inspection of lifejackets. They should recommend the immediate replacement of only the lifejackets that do not conform to the standards and not total replacement.”

He said Marina’s recent orders were “knee-jerk reactions” for the flak the agency, particularly Bautista, has been getting following the Senate and Congressional investigations on the recent maritime disasters that occurred in the country.

The group join small ship owners and the local class society firms in disputing the provision of yet another Marina circular that requires only one accredited class society for all domestic ship owners effective March 31, 2010.

The group said Marina’s directive would kill off competition as it would breed monopoly.

“Marina should allow the existing local class societies to band themselves together as one provided they comply with the international standards of the International Accreditation Class Society,” Ramirez said.

He added, “Small vessels can be classed by the Philippine government class society provided the inspectors are properly trained and not the kind of experts that Marina presented in the Senate recently who does not know the difference between inland waters and open seas and vessels designed for inland waters and open seas like the MV Baleno 9 which they approved to sail in open seas.”

The group also cited another circular wherein Marina has required all domestic ship owners to have their vessels enrolled in P&I Clubs so that the shipowners can police their own ranks against the operation of unseaworthy vessels.

Ramirez said  the insurance scheme should very well apply to large domestic ship owners and operators such as Aboitiz, Sulpicio and Nenaco to ensure liability to the large number of passengers and substantial cargo they are carrying.

At the same time, the group questioned the lifting of Marina’s preventive suspension on Sulpicio Lines’ MV Princess of the South and MV Princess of the Earth late last year because both vessels are covered only by local insurance and both have an insurance of only $1.5 million for wreck removal and $1.5 million for marine pollution which are not enough.

“A case in point is the MV Princess of the Stars which now becomes a navigational hazard because the cost wreck removal is $7 million. If MV Princess of the Stars was covered by P & I insurance, it could have been removed immediately,” Ramirez said.

“The international P&I Club set up is also not applicable to the operators or owners of small ferryboats and fast crafts. No small ship owner in his right mind would have his P5 million vessel insured under P&I for $15 million. A good idea is for Marina to initiate the establishment of a local P&I Club,” he added.

The group said that Bautista should have instead set standards based on the category or size of the vessel being insured.

Last week, small domestic ship owners asked President Gloria Arroyo and Department of Transportation and Communications Secretary Leandro Mendoza to have Bautista replaced by a competent person who knows the local maritime industry better or they would stage a “maritime holiday” beginning March 1, 2010. –JAMES KONSTANTIN GALVEZ Reporter, Manila Times