ARI, the Indian partners of the Maritime Academy of Nigeria (MAN) has pledged to the Academy that the first multifunctional Classroom simulator that has softwares like ECDIS, GMDSS, APAR RADARM high voltage training software, Rules Of The Road, DP, Pilotage and Blind Pilotage would arrive Nigeria by the end of September 2020.
While disclosing this in a recent briefing, the Rector of MAN, Commodore Duja Effedua (rtd) revealed that the current management of MAN has been able to advance the Academy’s equipment by getting three state-of-the-art simulators which are Full Mission Bridge Simulator, Full Mission Engine Room Simulator and Multi-functional Classroom simulator which is the latest as far as marine training simulator is concerned and can sit about 30 cadets in a work station.
According to the Rector, “The multifunctional classroom has the ECDIS, GMDSS, APAR RADARM HIGH VOLTAGE TRAINING software, RULES OF THE ROAD, PILOTAGE, BLIND PILOTAGE and the DP etc integrated into it. It is pertinent to state that the Academy is the only institution in Africa that has the Multifunctional Classroom. On the 3rd of September, 2020, our partners, the ARI of India assured us that all the Simulators will be in Nigeria by the end of September 2020 as soon as the embargo on international flights gets relaxed.
“In order to avoid the mistakes of the past, the Academy has trained 15 of its ICT staff as both users and maintainers at the manufacturer’s facilities in India. The ICT team was fully involved in the training as they can now assemble, dismantle as well as carry out repairs on the simulators. The Academy will therefore not need to fall back to the manufacturers for maintenance.”
In the area of training, the Rector said: “Apart from cadets training, the Academy is also involved in the retraining/training of staff of the Maritime Industry. From January 2018 to March 2020 before the national lockdown, a total of 8,508 seafarers including participants for Certificate of Competence were successfully trained. The breakdown of the number of seafarers trained is as follows: Number of Certificate of Competence participants is 1,707; while the number of Mandatory Short Courses participants stands at 6,801.
“The management has been able to buy publications and provide training materials such as free laptops for cadets. The classrooms are now smart classrooms equipped with smart boards and other electronic teaching aids, all air-conditioned. Our hostels are now en-suite. To further boost the quality of training, more lecturers have been engaged for all the schools including a foreign master mariner (Captain) from India and the Academy is looking forward to engaging more qualified international lecturers to support our Nigerian professionals.”
