Alhaji Muktar Shagari stormed NIWA’s Lokoja HQ Thursday with a battle cry against deadly boat disasters—”enough is enough”—vowing iron-fisted safety regs, hi-tech monitoring and pro culture to transform Nigeria’s 3,000+ km of rivers, creeks and lagoons into bustling trade lifelines, easing killer road congestion per Tinubu’s Renewed Hope blueprint.
From dredging chokepoints and jetty facelifts to rewarding top talent while whipping discipline across 23 bases and ports like Onitsha/Baro, Shagari syncs with the President’s expansion drive—tapping waterways’ untapped gold for cargo hauls, farm boosts, tourism booms and green energy, potentially slashing logistics costs by 30-40% if past studies hold, while shielding passengers from recurrent tragedies that claim hundreds yearly.
Acting MD Umar Yusuf-Girei cheered the ex-governor’s savvy timing amid NIWA’s 1997 mandate evolution, proving this board-staff pact could catapult the agency from regulatory watchdog to national progress powerhouse—unlocking billions in GDP if safety sticks and infra flows.
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