The business community involved in the shipping and maritime industries is very supportive of President Bongbong Marcos' appointees to their sector.
The shipowners, shipping companies and associations, maritime schools and training institutions and even the stakeholders in the periphery of the industry have expressed their support for the right choices of the President -- Secretary Jaime J. Bautista of the Department of Transportation (DOTr), Undersecretary for Maritime Elmer Francisco U. Sarmiento, and MARINA Administrator Atty. Hernani N. Fabia.
Among the three, it is Atty. Fabia is in the forefront of ensuring that the Philippines conforms with the 1978 Convention on the Standards of Training, Certification and Watchkeeping (STCW) for seafarers.
This is because the MARINA, which he heads, is mandated by law to be the single maritime administration in the implementation of the STCW. Thru its STCW Office, the agency establishes the policies and procedures for its stakeholders – covering the provisions on training, certification and assessment system of Filipino seafarers to ensure that they are well educated, trained and equipped with knowledge and competencies aligned with national and international standards.
Incidentally, under Administrator Fabia, the STCW Office of MARINA was recently granted the continuance of certification to ISO 9001:2015, completing the certification cycle of its Quality Management System in its Central Office as well as its satellite and regional offices.
The shipowners, maritime schools and training institutions, logistics firms, shipyards and the majority of stakeholders in the maritime industry have supported Administrator Fabia because of the innovations that he has started to implement in MARINA.
Fabia, who left the private sector to join the government just last July, understandably inherited many problems of the agency from his predecessors, particularly the immediate one, Vice Admiral Robert Empedrad
And yet the Inquirer, true to its character of being the prophet of doom in local media, came out with the screaming headline, "50K PH SEAFARERS RISK JOB LOSS ON EU VESSELS," (PDI, Oct. 28, 2022) the source of the banner story being Jerome Pampolina, Assistant Secretary for sea-based services of the Department of Migrant Workers (DMW).
While it is true that the Philippines has some problems with the European Maritime Safety Agency (Emsa), the discrepancies and non-compliance with Emsa rules had been present since year 2020, and since then, the government particularly former President Benigno Aquino III, the Congress of the Philippines and the Department of Foreign Affairs had taken measures to solve the problem.
Administrator Fabia, who has just started serving in MARINA, is not directly responsible for these discrepancies but he is doing his level best to upgrade our maritime score in compliance not just with Emsa but also with the International Maritime Organization (IMO), the specialized agency of the United Nations which is responsible for measures to improve the safety and security of international shipping and to prevent pollution from ships.
Let us give MARINA and Administrator Atty. Hernani Fabia the chance to put everything in order, as President Bongbong Marcos has given his trust in their capability to serve.