THE IMPLEMENTING BODIES.

One thing is to legislate and another is to have a body or bodies which must apply this legislation. At the national level it seems that there are three or so bodies which are concerned with the code. Following the code these bodies at the national level are:

-The national shipping line, which is a vessel operating carrier which has its head office and its effective control in that country and is recognised as such by an appropriate authority of that country or under the law of that country.

“The shippers organi2ation which is an association or

equivalent body which promotes, represents and protects the interest of shippers and if this association so

desires,can be recognized in that capacity by the appropriate authority of that country whose shipper is represented.

-An appropriate authority which may be a government or a body designed by the government or by national legislation to perform any of the functions ascribed to such an authority by the provisions of the code.

Looking into the different texts drawn up for the enforcement of the code, three such institutions seems to be the right number of implementing bodies. Firstly the Ministry of Transport and Trade seems to be designated by the government as an appropriate authority. Secondly the shippers council seems to be the administrative body of the code and the national shipping line the beneficiary of the cargo sharing formula.

a) The Appropiate Authority Body in the Implementation: The Ministry of Transport and Trade.

The role of the appropriate authority, as said earlier, seems be assumed by the Ministry of Trade and Transport.This is confirmed by the role it plays in carrying out the enforcement of the code. As we defined it earlier an appropriate authority is a body designed to do those things under which the code says it cah or should do The code did not say anything about the status of such a body.Clearly, an appropriate authority can be a part of the government, as it is in Togo . It is through an examination of what an appropriate authority can do rather than through a study of the obscurely

•worded definition that we can arrive at an understanding of what it really is.

Certain attributes of an appropriate authority are found in the definition of the code . According to the code an appropriate authority could :

-Recognise a national shipping line.

-Recognise if it so desires a shippers organisation.

-An appropriate authority can request that its views on the admission of a new member to a conference be taken into account.

-Appropriate authorities of the countries at both ends of the trade may, if they so wish, take up the matter of a disagreement between their groups of national shipping lines on the question of pooling and make their views known. It seems, however, that an appropriate authority cannot act on its own in such matters

-Conferences shall provide machinery for reporting.upon request,to appropriate authorities on action taken in connection with malpratices, etc.

-Conferences shall make available to .the appropriate authorities.upon request, copies of the conference agreement and other related documents.

-Appropriate authorities shall have the right, upon request,to participate in consultations but this does not mean they play a decision-making role.

-Appropriate authorities have a right to request informa­ tion and notice of intended action by the

conferences^*!>.

Following this, there is no doubt that the Ministry of Trade and Transport in Togo plays the role

of an appropriate authority. The Ministry as an

appropriate authority has choosen the national shipping

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line as a line which can belong to a conference system and carry the 40% of the code. The Ministry of Trade and Transport has organized the shippers council and recognized it as an administrative body of the code in the country.

b'lThe administrative body in the implementation : The National Shipper's Council.

The code does not deal directly with the question of how its application is to be administrated at inter­ national level <in the conference system) as well as at internal level (in a given country). The code is silent in this matter. In internal side there is no doubt that any given country having .ratified the code and trying to implement it, will have an administrative body. This administrative body can be the appropriate authority or other bodies which the government judges useful.

The most difficult administrative question in a given country seems to be the mechanism of cargo allocation. In Togo the Shippers Council, established by the government itself, is fully empowered to administrate the application of the code mainly in the question relating to cargo sharing. According to the

interministerial order no 03/MCT/MET of 20th May 1981 article 1, a national commission has been created in charge of the implementation of the interministerial order no 004/MFE/MCT of 9th February 1961 carrying the

regulations regarding maritime traffic in Togo.This commission is composed as follows :a president as the director of maritime affairs ; members : the directors of SOTONAM, STMP, SOAM, AGETRAC, CICA, SONACOM,OPAT, and a representative of the customs directorate. The commission is requested to carry out the duty of National Shipper's Council.This administrative role recognised by the government to the Shipper's Council makes it clear that the Shipper's Council represents the shippers but is closely linked to the government. This "para- public" character of the Shipper's Council is almost the same in all developing countries, mainly those from West and Central Africa countries. Because they have been promoted by the government and carried at the same time the role of administrating the code,those shippers councils of West and Central Africa have a union called the

Negotiating Committee of the Ministerial Conference of West and Central African states which is the only body to negotiate the freight rates with the conferences and to defend the interest of their national shipping lines.

The question raised is : having the

administrative role of the code, how does the shippers council follow the requirements of the code, in fact how can it be sure that its national line's rights are almost 40%? Neither the code, nor the implementing legislation has gone about this question ; but in pratice some techniques are used.

SECTION 2 : SOME PRACTICAL TECHNIQUES USED TO MEET