From Saka Bolaji Minna
Niger State Governor, Abubakar Sani Bello, has said that the solution to building collapse and delivery of substandard projects is for all the professionals in the construction industry to effectively collaborate.
The collaboration, Governor Bello said, should also be in the areas of training and workshops which would enable the professionals to draw from individual experience to achieve the desired goal.
Governor Bello made the suggestions in Minna on Wednesday in a message he sent to a two-day workshop organised by the Nigerian Institute of Surveyors for its members in the north central geo- political zone of the country.
Represented by the permanent secretary in the state ministry of works Architect Umaru Bawa, Governor Bello lamented that if professionals in the construction industry worked at cross purposes it would not only jeopardise the objectives for which projects were planned but also lead to loss of hard earned public resources.
His words: “We are in a profession that we cannot do without each other, for the betterment of the construction industry we all have to work together”.
The governor said in the modern era there was need for training and retraining because knowledge acquired over the years without being renewed could be eroded.
Vice Chancellor (VC), Federal University of Technology, Minna Prof. Musbau Akanji in an address said most universities in the country depended on funds from donor agencies which has made accountability and due process necessary for such funds to be accessed.
His words: “Spending money and grants from international agencies and donors will become very difficult without adherence to the procurement act. The enactment of the procurement act has brought a lot of technicalities to award of contracts”
Prof. Akanji disclosed that recently procurement officers from Abuja were in his university during which they went through all the books and gave the university a clean bill of health.
National President of the Institute, Mrs Mercy Tokwase Iyorter, in an address said the workshop was organised in the six geo political zones of the country in line with the constitution of the organization.
A communiqué is expected at the end of the workshop.
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