Chief of Navy Staff (CNS), Rear Admiral Adam Issah Yakubu says the blue economy holds prospects of over US$2 trillion. However, these prospects cannot be harnessed if importance was not placed on networking and collaboration with member states and other international bodies.
Speaking at the closing ceremony of the 3rd International Maritime Defence Exhibition and Conference (IMDEC), hosted by Ghana Navy and Great Minds Events in Accra, on Wednesday,
he was happy that this had been attained at the conference.
“From today, I can pick my phone and call any of my neighbours or other countries if we have a challenge and to resolve it amicably, because of the interactions that we had.
“We have also agreed, particularly in the Gulf of Guinea (area), to do a combined maritime taskforce and information sharing where we can do coordinated patrols to ensure that our waters are safe to protect the huge investment that we have in the ocean,” he said.
According to him, the navy had some take-away from the exhibition, which included the advantages of Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV) for surveillance and diving machines for inspecting cables wired under the seabed.
Previously, he said, “we use to send physical divers (humans) to inspect these cables, but now we have the remote operating vehicles that can send images we can watch on the laptops, phones and tablets.
“We’ve seen cutting edge technologies during this conference that would help us solve our problems.” He added that the spontaneous eruption of coup d’etats on the African soil have not so far had any effects on maritime security.
The Deputy Minister for Defence, Kofi Amankwa-Manu, on his part called for a continued collaboration between regional and international agencies, as well as new technologies to combat crime at sea.
According to him, this effort would inure to the benefit of the Gulf of Guinea states in mitigating challenges that hinder their collective aspirations.
He said previous conferences and exhibitions had presented great solutions to the country’s maritime security challenges and hoped this was no different.
Mr Kofi Amankwa-Manu stated that piracy and terrorism remain the major security concerns of the West African region and was confident that the conference has fashioned out solutions to meet these problems.
He noted that the ideas espoused by the experts at the conference would promote safe and secured maritime domain for the blue economy of Ghana and the entire Gulf of Guinea region to thrive.
The deputy minister was particularly happy with the outcome of the conference that is in tandem with the Yaoundé Architecture.
The Yaoundé Architecture was signed in June 2013, by the leaders of the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS), the Economic Community of Central African States (ECCAS) and the Gulf of Guinea Commission (GGC) in Cameroon, to establish a common regional strategy to prevent and prosecute illicit activities in the waters of the Gulf of Guinea.
Mr Kofi Amankwa-Manu was glad that “this conference comes at an opportune time when we take stock of the Yaounde Architecture for Maritime Security (YAMS). Discussion held shows how integral the YAMS is rallying member states in tackling the litany of issues that had troubled our waters in the past. Critical concern to me is the need for us to prevent the excess between piracy and terrorism.”
