Fish Crisis At Tema Harbour: Only 4 Of 76 Commercial Fishing Vessels Functional | General News

The Deputy Director in charge of Surveys and Inspections at the GMA, Capt. William Eson Thompson, blamed fishing vessel operators for failing to raise their game.

“We realized that most of the vessels failed to take advantage of the closed fishing season to undertake maintenance to ensure that all safety issues were dealt with. It was only when they realized that the Fisheries Ministry was not going to compromise on the issuance of licenses without the GMA certification that they decided to come to us,” he said.

The life-raft, a life-saving appliance on board vessels, which is deployed to temporarily accommodate a crew when a ship is lost at sea, was malfunctioning in most of the vessels, with some of them tied by ropes, Capt. Thompson disclosed.

He said until the recent decision by the ministry to inspect the GMA safety certification before issuing licenses for vessels, “most of the companies did not care about putting some of these important components in good condition”.

Capt. Thompson said the GMA was about to sign onto the implementation of new safety regulations for vessels, in line with the Cape Town Agreement.

He indicated that the authority had held discussions with the relevant stakeholders on raising the safety standards in the industry, bearing in mind the May incident involving the Comforter II vessel.

The Cape Town Agreement is to protect the lives of fishermen' at sea by establishing standards for vessel construction and related seaworthiness.