The government of Indonesia has approved maritime training scholarships worth $1.3m USD to the Maritime Organisation of West and Central Africa (MOWCA) for training of 96 persons.
Secretary General of MOWCA, Dr. Paul Adalikwu who confirmed this after signing an agreement with the Indonesian authorities for the training said seafarers from West and Central Africa would be availed the opportunity in two seperate programmes.
He added that the slots for the training is to be distributed among member states of the organisation.
Giving a breakdown of the programmes, Dr Adalikwu said one of the courses is a Training of Trainers (TOT) which is based on International Maritime Organisation (IMO) model course 6.09 which refers to training of instructors in the maritime field.
The second scholarship course, according to the MOWCA SG is a training for Assessment, Examination and Certification of Seafarers based on IMO model course 3.12 which refers to training of personnel from the maritime administrations and training institutions responsibile for seafarers certification, as well as officers involved in onboard assessment.
Stating the provisional dates for the two training programmes broken into four batches of 24 persons per batch, Dr Adalikwu said TOT programme Batch 1 will run from 11th to 26th of October 2025 while Batch 2 will be from 1st to 16th November 2025
For the TOE IMC 3.12 training, Batch 1 will run from 18th of October to 2nd of November 2025 while Batch 2 for the second course will hold from 15th to 30th of November 2025.
On the essence of the courses, the MOWCA SG said “The objective of the training programmes is to ensure that Certificates of Competence issued to seafarers from MOWCA region are fully compliant with the provisions of Standard of Training, Certification and Watchkeeping (STCW) Convention.
The scholarships cover the total cost of the programmes, including air transport, accommodation, tuition fees, and perdiems. for the TOT IMC 6.09 programme”
The SG also confirmed that MOWCA Ministers in charge of maritime transport have been duly informed about the training opportunities and eligibility conditions which include drug free confirmation tests for applicants . He added that the Ministers have also been advised to make applicants submissions not later than September 15, 2025.
The attraction of this human capacity grant from the Ministry of Transport, Indonesia is another milestone accomplishment by the SG aimed at boosting the competence of seafarers and instructors in the region.
MOWCA’s two academic institutions the Regional Maritime University, Ghana, (RMU), the Regional Academy of Science & Technology of the Seas (ARSTM) as well as the Maritime Academy of Nigeria (MAN) Oron are equally slated to benefit from the opportunity.