MAN Admits 450 Cadets,
Nigeria’s only government-owned maritime academy, the Maritime Academy of Nigeria of Nigeria (MAN) Oron, Akwa Ibom State has released its 2012 admission list. It has also started using the newly installed stimulator in the training of cadets in the academy.
Details of the prospective candidates, made available to THISDAY, indicated that a total of 450 cadets are expected to arrive at the Oron institution on April 15, to start registration the following day. Lectures are expected to commence on April 17.
“Upon their arrival, all new cadets are expected to report to the Regimental Unit Commander (RUC) for registration formalities, accommodation and other instructions”, the statement added.
It also warned that any new cadet who “fails to report after the expiration of one month from the date of resumption would be considered as having forfeited his/her admission.”
A breakdown of the admission list shows that Maritime Transport and Business Studies have the highest number of cadets. It has total number of 154 cadets while Nautical Sciences has 78. Others are Marine Engineering 136, Electrical and Electronics Engineering 46 and Boat/Ship Building Technology 36.
Similarly, out of the 78 students that were admitted for Nautical Sciences, 15 are from the host state, Akwa Ibom, while Niger, Abia, Ekiti, Taraba, Imo, FCT had one cadet each. Lagos and Ondo states had only two.
In the same vein, out of the 136 admitted for Marine Engineering, about 38 are from Akwa Ibom State. Also, out of the 154 that were admitted for Maritime Transport and Business Studies, Akwa Ibom State alone accounted for about 23 intakes.
The use of the modern training stimulators by cadet followed its successful installation in the school premises.
Acting Rector of MAN, Oron, Mr. Joshua Okpo, the academy described the feat as one of the academy’s areas of focus aimed at equipping its cadets with the requisite practical skills to man and operate the modern vessels.
He added that with the development students of the academy now have the opportunities of operating a virtual ship on campus ahead of their mandatory sea time experience.
He explained that with the successful installation, Okpo said Nigeria’s foremost maritime training institution is now number one in the West African sub region as the Ghana-based Regional Maritime University does same kind of training with an analogue facility. This, according to him, places Nigeria ahead of Ghana in terms of training infrastructure.
He urged Nigerians who have had cause to travel out of the country for various regular and short courses to now look inwards as the much-sought-after facilities required to boost their skills and competence in line with global standards is now being brought to their doorsteps.
His words: “We have identified our areas of need and will continue to upgrade this institution with the state of the art training facilities to meet our national demands and international standards.
“We are set, not only to offer quality training to Nigerians alone but to accommodate in the nearest future, nationals of Anglophone, francophone and Arab speaking African countries as we have a fully functional language laboratory inside the simulator building to offer training using multi-lingual approach.
“We are making plans for more simulators to widen our capacity and meet up the IMO requirement of producing 15,000 seafarers in Nigeria and the Gulf of Guinea. As we expand based on the availability of funds, we will continue to attract the best and seasoned training personnel with vast academic, sea and other experiences in our move to be ranked among the best in the world.
“Our cadets can now undertake Global Maritime Distress Security System (GMDSS) training which hitherto Nigerians had to travel to Ghana, South Africa and Europe for. They now have their hands on the bridge, deck, radar and many more facilities where they can undertake practical in a damage, injury and risk free virtual ship training environment. By this development, we have migrated from mere theoretical training on seamanship to a blend of theory and practical-based training.”
“We are also in the process of bringing in more simulators and software that will improve on the quality of our cadets in various areas such as dynamic positioning required in the oil sector for ship to rig crane operation. New courses like hydrography will also be incorporated into our training system and we hope to commence training with improved IMO and World Maritime University curriculum,” Okpo said.
A recent batch of NIMASA supervised Certificate of Competence (COC) trainees used the simulator barely a week after its installation by some Norwegian experts and competent master mariners, engineers and technicians have been assigned to the facility on a train the trainer operation.
The new simulator which was made in Norway is coming ahead of additional software and simulators that are preparatory to the planned upgrade of MAN, Oron to a degree awarding institution by the Federal Government.
Source: allAfrica.com