Business Post Contributor
By Ashemiriogwa Emmanuel
The Nigeria Society of Engineers (NSE) has urged the federal government to always outsource its project to professionals capable of executing the job well and stop patronising quacks.
The group stated that the failure of the government to consult with NSE representatives when preparing a budget on infrastructure has resulted in poor infrastructural development in Nigeria.
A member of the NSE, Mr Olufemi Babalola, said this at the 27th Arokodare memorial public lecture held on Monday, October 25, at the University of Ibadan.
He said that a Chartered Institute of Project Management of Nigeria’s survey revealed that 56,000 government projects with an estimated N12 trillion across Nigeria had been abandoned.
Stressing the significance of the capital budget from the development fund described in sections 318 to 324 of the financial regulations of Nigeria, he said that the accuracy of the plan enables the smooth running of implementation.
He said, “We have seen situations where the government sited gigantic projects, and you notice that over the years, these projects are found isolated.
“We also find ourselves in a situation whereby different ministries of the same government vote to fund the same functional elements of infrastructural projects.
“In the past, engineers designed projects for government to fund but today, government comes up with a budget and tells engineers to prepare design that will suit the budget.”
In his view, this is not effective and will not produce expected infrastructural results that Nigerians will enjoy, stressing that with this, such a project was “dead on arrival.”
“In 2019, Nigeria voted only 24 per cent of N8.9 trillion budget on capital infrastructure out of which only N1.2 trillion, representing 57 per cent of the vote, was released.
“Last year, only N1.7 trillion of the N2.5 trillion, representing 33.5 per cent of budget voted for capital projects was released,” he disclosed.
