Section 17: Enforcement of Convention relating to oil pollution

(1) The Minister may by order published in the Federal Gazette empower such persons as may be designated by or under the order to go on board any ship to which the Convention of 1954 to 1962 applies, while the ship is within a harbour in Nigeria and to require production of any records required to be kept in accordance with that Convention.
(2) An order under this section may, for the purposes of this Act and with necessary modifications, apply any of the provisions of this Act relating to production and inspection of records, and the taking of copies of entries therein, and to the admissibility in evidence of such records and copies including any provisions of the Merchant Shipping Act applied by those provisions and including any penal provisions of this Act in so far as they relate to those matters.
(3) For the purposes of this section the Minister, if satisfied that the government of any country has accepted, or denounced, the Convention of 1954, or that the Convention of 1954 to 1962 extends, or has ceased to extend, to any territory, may by order make a declaration to that effect; and in this section "ship to which the Convention of 1954 to 1962 applies" means a ship registered in-
(a) a country the government of which has been so declared to have accepted that Convention and has not been so declared to have denounced it; or
(b) a territory to which it has been so declared that the Convention extends, not being a territory to which it has been so declared that the Convention has ceased to extend.
(4) Subsection (3) of this section shall apply to any subsequent Convention, in so far as it relates to the prevention of pollution of the sea by oil, as those provisions apply to the Convention of 1954 to 1962.