In order to answer the above questions let us proceed on the pedestal of another question: who is a Merchant Navy? Merchant Navy is a country commercial ships and people who work on them; who were trained to serve on land and on sea. A nation Merchant Navy fleet comprises the ships that are used to transport Cargo during times of peace and war. In most western climes, the Merchant Navy is often referred to as the fourth-estate of National Defense. The Nigerian Merchant Navy was statutorily constituted through the Shipping and Navigational Ordinances No 47 of 1917, No 12 of 1919 and No 53 of 1922 (Cap 104) as colonial Marine Department or Directorate headed by a Director of Marine. The Marine Department was created in 1914 after the merger of Northern and Southern marine detachments (Merchant Navy). The merger originated mercantile Marine, the armed merchant ships and trading companies (like John Holt, Lever Brothers, U.A.C etc) of the 19th century, which in collaboration with Royal Navy helped to colonize Nigeria. In 1922, King George V changed the name of the mercantile service to Merchant Navy in recognition of its role in world war I. Nigerian Navy was formed because of the attacks the Merchant Navy was facing on the high Sea, at a Sea Spot called SEA LOBER because there were not armed, trained and equipped. The British Government then followed up with the secondment of 200 officers and men with eleven small boats and harbour crafts for conversion into Royal-Independent-Navy Force from the defunct Merchant Navy. The term “Royal” was dropped when Nigeria became a Republic as Nigerian Navy -fledging- ventured into the naval world, while the Merchant Navy was neglected. The surprise stroke is that the enabling ordinance (a version of an Act) establishing the Merchant Navy has not been repealed even though some of her Omnibus (then) functions have been dismembered and given to the followings: The Federal Ministry of Transport (FMOT), Nigerian Port Authority (NPA), Nigerian Maritime Authority (NMA), Nigerian Maritime Safety Agency (NIMASA), and National Inland Water Ways (NIWA). These were done through constitutional frameworks, Military decrees, Acts of Parliament (and their amendments) at different eras after Nigeria became an Independent State and a republic in 1960-THE NMNC IS NO DOUBT LARGELY DISENFRACHISED. The non-enforcement of relevant provisions of the extant Shipping and Navigational Ordinances No 47 of 1917, No 12 of 1919 and No 53 of 1922 (Cap 104) which created the Nigerian Merchant Navy Corps should be a matter for administrative and judicial inquests.
