No country can develop technologically by depending solely on the expertise of other nationals, President of Council for the Registration of Engineering in Nigeria (COREN) Kashim Ali has said. He said this recently when he visited the Sokoto State Governor Aminu Waziri Tambuwal.
Ali said COREN registered engineering personnel must be given the opportunity to practice their profession even as he described as misnomer the attitude of allowing foreign companies to handle major engineering jobs in the country.
Ali said, “Indigenous capacity must be developed if we must move forward.
While, we advocate for engineering personnel to be allowed active participation in the infrastructural development process, we must always remind ourselves that to whom much is given, so much is expected. We must be prepared to stand for value for money in engineering projects to which we are responsible.”
The COREN president, however, said that engineering personnel must hold themselves accountable to their projects and must embrace the anti-corruption war of the present administration.
“We recognise that over 90% of the nation’s appropriation is in engineering projects through which a greater percentage of corruption takes place.
“Even though acts of corruption in engineering projects are not necessarily perpetrated by engineers, they are usually blamed for the occurrence. It can no longer be business as usual. Any engineering personnel involved in any corrupt practice directly or indirectly will be severely sanctioned,” he warned.
Ali further advised engineers to desist from acts of corruption in engineering projects.
“It is for these and to ensure that there is total compliance to the COREN regulations that the Engineering Regulation Monitoring (ERM) was inaugurated in 1997.
The objectives of the programme are to ensure that engineering is practiced in Nigeria in accordance to relevant codes of engineering practice, enforce maintenance of discipline and strict standards of ethics in the practice of the engineering profession in Nigeria and foster speedy acquisition of all relevant engineering and technological skills by Nigerians required to accelerate developmental efforts and speedy modernization of Nigeria.
ERM is aimed at ensuring that engineering is practised in Nigeria in line with global best practices. We cannot aford to do otherwise,” he said.
He said that ERM has been repackaged and repositioned to make it more effective.
“Under the new policy, ERM is now domiciled with the Nigerian Society of Engineers and run by the Engineering Associations of NSE, NATE, NISET and NAEC with the Nigerian Police and the Development Control Department of the State Government represented in each Inspectorate.
ERM Inspectors are now to bite, not just to bark. We must carry out the mandate of COREN to the letter. Inspectors are charged to ensure that quacks or impostors no longer have a field day in engineering projects. Even for bonafide registered engineering personnel, there is no room for shoddy jobs or sharp practices anymore,”he said.
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