The process of disembarkation-repatriation kicks in the moment stowaways are found on board. The master’s role in collecting evidence and documentation is crucial to this process. P & I Clubs often point out that as much information as possible should be solicited from the stowaways and passed on to relevant actors, such as the local P & I correspondent, at the earliest opportunity. This is to allow the correspondents get the disembarkation-repatriation process in train before the ship’s arrival in port.
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Section 4.6.1 of the FAL Convention states that shipmasters shall be required ‘to make every effort to establish the identity, including nationality/citizenship of the stowaway and the port of embarkation of the stowaway’, and pass the information to next ports of call, the ship owner, the port of embarkation as well as the flag state (IMO 2011a, p. 40). Appendix 3 of the convention also provides a ‘stowaway form’ for the purpose of soliciting the necessary information including where the stowaway boarded with date and time, name, gender, date of birth, claimed nationality, if there are any identification documents, ‘general physical description of the stowaway’, languages spoken and written by the stowaway and so on. (IMO 2011a, pp. 67-68)
P & I Clubs and their correspondents, on the other hand, provide detailed guidelines on how to collect evidence on board. Before interrogating the stowaways, seafarers are advised to collect any physical evidence from the area where the stowaways have been hiding, including any identification documents, tools, drugs as well as items, such as food left overs and packaging, which may provide some clue about where the stowaways boarded. Mobile phones carried by the stowaways are also important sources of information as ports of embarkation as well as the nationalities of the stowaways can be known based on the country codes in the contacts list, call logs as well as from any pictures on the phone. One seafarer, for instance, pointed out how they were able to identify where the stowaways boarded and their nationalities from photos stored on the phones possessed by the stowaways.
One form used by a P & I correspondent, and obtained by the author, goes into much detail about information shipmasters should collect for the purpose of identifying the nationalities of stowaways. These include marital status, spouse’s name, parent’s names, permanent home address, occupation, last school attended, name of headmaster, ‘name of capital of your country’, ‘name of president of your country’, ‘name of currency used in your country’, ‘the colours of your flag’, height, hair colour, eye colour, any tattoos, scars, vaccination scars, etc. (P & I correspondent’s stowaway questionnaire, author’s source). While such details were initially included in the 1997 IMO Guidelines on the Allocation of Responsibilities to Seek the Successful Resolution of Stowaway Cases, they were not included when the FAL Convention was amended to include a section on stowaways nor when the guidelines were revised in 2011 (see IMO 1997, pp. 8-9; 2011a, pp. 67-68; 2011b, pp. 13-14). GARD P & I Club’s guidance on stowaways also includes in its ‘Stowaway Questionnaire for On board Interrogation Purposes’ such details as religion, tribe, chief and sub-chief (GARD No Year). These questionnaires are provided in a number of languages that are commonly known to be spoken
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by stowaways. They include Swahili and other African languages, English, French, Arabic, Spanish, etc. depending on the area of trade. However, questionnaires in any language can be obtained by the network of local correspondents P & I Clubs have at their disposal across the globe.
The reason these questionnaires are so specific and detailed is because P & I correspondents need to ascertain the nationalities of the stowaways before they approach the appropriate embassies/consulates for travel documents. Furthermore, as all clubs and their correspondents emphasise, ascertaining the nationalities of stowaways can prove to be a daunting task. This is due to the reluctance of stowaways to provide the correct information regarding their places of origin. The clubs and their correspondents take it for granted that stowaways will provide the wrong information about their nationalities. Stowaways also admitted resorting to lying about their nationalities if they thought it would increase their chances of success or wanted to drag the process out for the purpose of extorting ‘pocket money’.
It’s very much detective work because they can tell you anything. I mean that’s why with the questionnaires we have a lot of questions: what colour is your flag? What is your language? On the African ones, it could be... one of the questions is what tribe do you belong to? Who’s your president? As I say then, we can pass those questionnaires to the correspondent in Tanzania and then they can look at the answers and say, ‘actually, I think he’s from Kenya. The fact that he said whatever he said. That’s a tribe based in Kenya, not in Tanzania,’ for example. So, those ways of trying to capture what they say if it’s true or not. […] We ask for things like father’s name, mother’s name. Because of course there are some, again African names that are made of the father’s name, their Christian name, and things like that. What work did your father do? They say, ‘well my father is a coal miner’ or something like that. So, they actually can’t be from such and such country because there’s no coal mining, you know. So, tricky things like that. […] Unless you are fortunate enough to come across a piece of paper that you might find or a mobile phone or something like that, near enough all of them, all of them lie. (Nick, senior claims executive, P & I Club B)
In December, I took a ship. [He take ship in December. He been with the ship for three months. But he told the Captain he is from Liberia. So, the ship
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company decided to take him to Liberia]. I told them I am from Liberia first because maybe they gonna release me, because by that time Liberia got war.
(Mbongo Mzulu, Tanzanian stowaway, interpreted by Mohab)
Seafarers are certainly not equipped to identify the nationalities of stowaways in every case. Nonetheless, they remain important actors during the onboard interrogation and documentation phase. Their reports and collation of evidence assist P & I correspondents in determining where stowaways are from. Hence, the seafarers’ interrogatory and investigative roles are critical phases in getting stowaways off the ship. Based on cues, such as the ports the ships visited, the common nationalities of stowaways in those parts of the world, physical features such as facial scars and vaccination marks and so on, the correspondents are much more adept at identifying where the stowaways are from. It takes lots of effort, experience and local knowledge to work out the nationalities of the stowaways. It is, inter alia, precisely for this reason that the local P & I correspondent is an indispensable actor in the disembarkation-repatriation process. P & I Clubs and some captains have strongly emphasised the crucial role played by the local P & I correspondent during the interviews.