Abuja – Ocean of professionals, poor management

From the prominence attached to capitals nations, the annual cultural carnivals organized in Abuja to showcase our rich cultural heritages, Abuja is our pride, the symbol of our unity and the culminating point of cultural evolution of our nation seeking positive image. In summary, Abuja is the image of Nigeria; it therefore deserves the best […]

From the prominence attached to capitals nations, the annual cultural carnivals organized in Abuja to showcase our rich cultural heritages, Abuja is our pride, the symbol of our unity and the culminating point of cultural evolution of our nation seeking positive image. In summary, Abuja is the image of Nigeria; it therefore deserves the best of investment for efficiency and best services.
          It is pertinent to note that the various departments that make up the Federal Capital Development Authority (FCDA), the Abuja Metropolitan Management Council (AMMC) and all the Mandate Secretariats are flooded not only with fellows of professional bodies from the various institutes of the built environment but also with the leaderships of the institutes at the highest level. These include the Nigerian Society of Engineers, Nigerian Institutes of Town Planners, Architects, Surveyors, Builders, Quantity Surveyors and Estate Surveyors and Values. Each of these professional institutions has its Regulatory Body saddled with the formal registration of its members. Appointments to management cadre, and promotions in all the technical departments charged with the city management as in all public sectors are predicated on senior staff eligibility and registration to these regulatory bodies. Almost all the senior staff are registered to at least one or more of the Professional Institutes, while most of the Heads of these Departments are either senior members or fellows of these Professional Institutes. If the National Presidents of the Institutes are not residents of Abuja at least they are regular visitors. Their commitments to excellence of services delivery in Abuja should be paramount, because of the city’s status as the image of the nation. Yet, and unfortunately, essential services delivery hardly translates into commensurate status for the services and management of facilities obtained in the city.
With all these caliber of professionals in the Nations Capital what we must expect is strict compliance to rules of law as sanctioned by the Codes of Conduct and Practice Regulations from all the registered members of these Professional Regulatory Bodies. To the Town Planners in the Departments responsible for enforcement, they must check and eradicate incidences of unauthorized or fake layouts and land titles. They must not allow indiscriminate and unauthorized change of land use, and must not discriminate while enforcing the law. These include the conversions of structures in sold government quarters and changes of residential buildings to banks, offices, hotels, etc. Also buildings on streams and valleys and areas liable to flooding must be checked. Other activities the professionals must ensure to eradicate are conversions of accesses and parking areas to plots, conversions of parks to bars and drinking joints, and hawking at unauthorized spots. All illegal erections of structures must stop, while ensuring that there are no delays in processing building plans approval.
It is inconceivable that with the number and caliber of the professionals in the Technical Departments saddled with City Management in Abuja yet we have walkways are either turned to prime ways or used for parking, storm water drains turned to waste drains, underground walkways converted to shops and restaurants. Hawking and illegal parking activities blocking traffic and occupying the roads at major entry points and departures to and from the city are the order of the day, and ugly situation are either ignored or encouraged by the law enforcement agencies. Others are the location of security check points on highways with open and unashamed extortion of ordinary citizens by the security agencies while creating unnecessary traffic bottlenecks at odd hours, when people should have for long reached their homes to the comfort of their families.
What should be a major embarrassment to the authority and leaderships of our professional institutes considering the status of Abuja, which is a new city of not more than 30 years from commencement of buildings, is the incidences of building collapse. This is a typical characteristic of the old cities that have buildings of more than 100 years. We advocate for regular joint visitations of the professional institutes and their regulatory bodies to the various heads of the technical departments of the authority. This should serve as a clarion call to the Institutes.