Safety policies to implement in Nigeria's water tourism sector.

For some days I have been caught up in my own thoughts of why we are always tending to compromise quality and safety in virtually everything we do in Nigeria.

Before I dive into conversations around the safety regulations for boat cruise and water transportation in Nigerian water ways, I would like to ask you, when was the last time you went to a club with your hard-earned money to buy high end drinks and went home with the satisfaction that comes from consuming premium brand of remarkable qualities? Without any doubt I already know that many people here cannot remember and the reason is that the people who are supposed to enforce consumer safety implementation with such products are often heavily induced and compromised such that they do not care about what is sold in the market.

How would you explain to me that within the space of two weeks, Nigeria has had two terrible boat accidents? One of the accidents took one hundred and three (103) lives and it happened in Kwara State with the latest happening in Calabar at Marina Resort which took the lives of three (3) Nigerian Medical students.

The truth is that most of these deaths that happen in the sea are under reported because in most of these cases the victims are usually the poor in the society. We are well informed about the unfortunate incident at Marina Resort because the unfortunate event was caught on camera and also because they belong to an elite class of the society as doctors in training. What can we say of the many other lives that are routinely lost but are not publicized?

From negligence, incompetence, lackadaisical attitude of crew members and Management of Marina resort which resulted in leaky boats, poor condition and integrity of vests, poorly maintained boats engines which routinely went off during the trips, fuel finishing before they got back ashore, little or no supervision by management, poor regulation and monitoring were what culminated in the careless loss of the lives of these youths.

The time to take our safety policies serious in industries as delicate as the cruise industry is now.