Direct Request (CEACR) - adopted 2015, published 105th ILC session (2016)

Certification of Able Seamen Convention, 1946 (No. 74) - Guinea-Bissau (Ratification: 1977)

The Committee notes with regret that the Government’s report has not been received. It hopes that the next report will contain full information on the matters raised in its previous comments.

Repetition

Article 2 of the Convention. Conditions for certification of able seamen. The Committee notes the Government’s statement that a gap analysis of the national maritime legislation has already been completed with the assistance of the Office and that the MLC, 2006, is in the Popular National Assembly. Recalling the Government’s indication in previous reports that while the outdated Decree No. 15.969 of 15 October 1964 dealt with the subject matter of the Convention, the revised General Labour Law would include a chapter of maritime labour, the Committee requests the Government to indicate any progress made in this regard and to transmit a copy of the new legal text once adopted.

Further, the Committee recalls that, in the course of the negotiations that eventually led to the adoption of the MLC, 2006, it was agreed that the responsibility for seafarers’ training and certification – except for ships’ cooks – should be transferred to the International Maritime Organization (IMO) and that the provisions of the present Convention would be eventually superseded by new mandatory provisions to be adopted under the Convention on Standards of Training, Certification and Watchkeeping (STCW Convention). The Committee notes, in this respect, that the Manila amendments to the STCW Convention and Code, adopted in June 2010 and entered into force on 1 January 2012, contain in Regulation II/5 new requirements for certification of ratings as able seafarers deck. Recalling that the Government continues to be bound by the provisions of Convention No. 74 until the MLC, 2006, enters into force for Guinea-Bissau, the Committee requests the Government to provide information on any developments regarding the process of ratification of the MLC, 2006.