By Okwy Iroegbu-Chikezie

The profession of estate surveying and valuation is made to contribute to the  development. It is also geared towards a strong virile and balanced society in which valuers will provide a measurement for the economic cost of business and social activities.

While major impacts have been made for the good of the nation, it is, however, necessary for a re-invention, says Olusola Solomon Enitan, an estate surveyor.

He spoke at an event organised by valuers in Lagos.

However, he regretted that, in the last few years, the fortunes of their members had dwindled in the face of great economic and national development, as a result of increasing erosion of integrity in virtually all aspects of the profession.

He said: “Opportunities for the professional expression are daily lost to charlatans and other non professional entities, outright limitations were placed in our way by public sectoral organisations who ought to be beneficiaries of our skills, the professional reputation dwindled immensely, job losses became almost a daily occurrence”.

By Okwy Iroegbu-Chikezie

First Vice President, Nigeria Institution of Estate Surveyors & Valuers (NIESV), Mr. Emma Wike, has asked the Federal Government to invest over 50 percent recovered loot into housing provision.

He said he took that position knowing that most of the recovered funds from political office holders and politicians were more of proceeds from housing-related crime.

In an interview with The Nation in Lagos at an event organized by the institution to raise awareness on the need to housing provision, he also asked for single-digit interest for mortgages to curb corruption maintaining that most of the corrupt related cases have one thing or the other with housing.

He said: “The Federal Government should give the housing sector the deserved attention, and grant intervention fund as was done in aviation, agriculture, banking and recently film. At least 50 percent of all the recovered funds by EFCC should be channeled to the provision of affordable housing in all states of the federation.  There is a need for a review of the National Housing Fund Act to increase the statutory contribution and level of participation.”

Wike insisted that ownership of a house is a right and urged more Public Private Partnership (PPP) collaboration between government and operators in the sector.

Calling on the government to be more committed to housing provision as a social responsibility, he insisted that the funds concerned remains the people’s money and should be used for their benefit. He called on both the Federal and state governments to be more committed to affordable housing delivery as a core social responsibility to all Nigerians through utilizing housing as a catalyst for economic development and arresting urban decay through effective housing delivery strategies.

He further called on the government to engage professionals in the housing delivery value chain, reduce cost through modern techniques and construction materials, build a robust mortgage system in Nigeria with single-digit interest rate regime.

According to him, this will tame crime through city regeneration and further check insurgency.

By Okwy Iroegbu-Chikezie

THE Nigeria Institution of Surveyors (NIS) has agreed that the association needs to do more on training, skill acquisition and ethical standards.

It regretted that some unethical practices among members might have cost their clients some losses and is bent on addressing them with competitive training and welfare for members.

Chairman of Association of Private Practising Surveyors of Nigeria (APPSN), Akomolafe Ademola, at the workshop of the group  with the theme: “ Professionalism on the Cross: Surveying practices and  laws”, in Lagos, said the objectives of establishing the sub group of the institution was to afford members the opportunity of continuous development.

He said the association has put in a place a robust strategy that involves maintaining a strong and cordial relationship with relevant associations and institutions.

Admonishing the members he said: “To ensure that our practice is robust , sustainable and rewarding and how to make it better, it is important that we practise ethically putting the interest  and satisfaction of our clients in view but also working in line with set industry standards. To  this end the APPSN and NIS established the Practice Monitoring and investigating initiatives to give bite to our monitoring and investigating initiatives. It is important to also  warn our erring members that the administration will in no way tolerate unethical practice of any type”.

Chairman, Lagos NIS, Adeleke Adesina, said they were poised to sanitise the institution. He urged his colleagues to be versatile to serve the public more professionally, adding that those who circumvent the law would no longer be absolved.

The guest lecturer, Mr. Ogbebor Osaretin, a lawyer, urged surveyors to be multi-tasking to ensure they deliver service to their clients. He said some clients have lost their land as a result of ignorance by some surveyors who were not diligent enough to get facts and figures about a particular land that is in dispute.

According to him, a land is said to be in dispute when two or more persons claim ownership of it, with each of them relying on his or her root of title to the said land, to show a better title than the other.

He listed five ways in which ownership or title to land may be proved as:

• proof of traditional evidence;
• Proof of acts of ownership, acts by persons claiming the land such as selling, leasing, renting out all or part of the land, or farming on it or otherwise utilising the land beneficially such acts of time and numerous and positive enough to warrant the inference that he is the true owner;
• Proof of production of document of title which must be authenticated;
• Proof of ownership by acts of long possession and enjoyment in respect of the land to which the acts are done;
• Proof of possession of connected or adjacent land circumstances rendering it probable that the owner of such connected or adjacent land would in addition be the owner of the land in dispute, may rank also as means of proving ownership of the land in dispute.

He said a surveyor who did not know the above would incur losses.

He added that surveyors were the only professionals statutorily empowered to survey any parcel of land, with a view to determining its identity, location, size, shape, boundaries, area and description and to produce the plan thereof. They should not for any reason shirk their responsibilities.

Some 2.2 billion people lack safe drinking water and 4.2 billion live without access to adequate sanitation. The lack of access to water and sanitation make the public vulnerable to contracting Covid-19. The public is advised to wash their hands often with soap and maintain a level of hygiene but the greater number of people in our cities and towns without access to water and sanitation makes the future bleak in the face of the ravaging virus. Experts have canvassed the urgent need by the government to provide safe water and hygiene, reports OKWY IROEGBU-CHIKEZIE

The devastating effects of climate change have continued to  prevent communities from accessing safe, clean water. We are told that frequent hand washing with soap is a critical first line of defence against the novel Coronavirus.

This is because it inactivates and removes virus particles that may be on our hands. When used properly, soap effectively dissolves the fatty membrane that surrounds the virus particles, causing them to fall apart and be inactivated, experts say.

Water and sanitation are fundamental to fighting the virus, creating a more sustainable future and preserving the health and well-being of millions. With specific treatments or a vaccine not yet available, preventing its spread from person to person is vital to reduce the outbreak’s impact on people’s lives, health, livelihoods and the healthcare systems we all rely on.

However, despite established evidence of the effectiveness of good hygiene practice as the first line of defence in the prevention of infectious diseases, about 60 million people in Nigeria lack access to clean water supply services and 150 million people lack basic hand washing facilities with soap and water according to a report by United Nations WASH programme ( UN Water Sanitation and Health programme).

Unfortunately, most residents of our cities and rural areas cannot easily follow the Centre for Disease Control and Prevention’s advice to stay at home and wash their hands frequently because there is really no water. They buy water for their everyday use and do not think it is necessary to observe the rules, the truth being that most of them cannot afford to do it.

Levels of access to water, sanitation and hygiene services in rural communities are even more worrisome, making this segment of the population far more vulnerable. Worse, climate change is piling pressure on water resources that are already overstretched due to inadequate infrastructure, poor management and insufficient government funding.

Against this backdrop, millions of people are unable to practise frequent handwashing with soap and water, thereby increasing their risk of being susceptible to infectious diseases such as COVID-19.

WaterAid Nigeria, a British NGO, involved in water and sanitation in a statement said they would continue their work by supporting the Federal Ministry of Water Resources, the National Action Plan coordination office and the Clean Nigeria campaign secretariat in the Coronavirus response.

The statement stated that their work would include carrying out series of engagements to advocate for and raise awareness about improved water and sanitation access with hygienic behavioural change as a necessary first step in reducing the spread of the COVID-19 and other infectious diseases.

It said: “Our focus is on key hygienic behaviours including hand washing with soap, respiratory hygiene, social distancing, cleanliness and self-isolation and referral. We will also be supporting the government to scale up water, sanitation and hygiene services such as hand washing facilities in public places and healthcare facilities and using mass media to share important hand washing and hygiene messages.”

A campaigner for access to water and sanitation, Enejeta Oghene, challenged governments at the federal, state and local government levels on re-prioritisation of infrastructure services such as water provision, waste management and adequate housing. He said a situation where the public or most urban poor depended on “mai ruwa’ or water vendor and ‘pure water ‘sachet’ for their daily water need could not be  considered serious about fighting Covid-19. He condemned a situation where people have to trek several kilometres in the rural areas to fetch water as backward and would negate the fight against the deadly virus.

According to him, the middle or upper classes that have domestic hands such as drivers and cooks that come from those satellite areas where there is poor infrastructure are also not safe with such workers as they might get infected by them. He said it was worse for senior public servants who refused to ensure that necessary infrastructure were  put in place as a result of corruption.

He said:” More than any time in the annals of the history of our nation the high and mighty will suffer for their sins, as many have refused to provide the needed infrastructure that would have helped the majority of the people. Water and sanitation in other climes are free or at least in existence but unfortunately, Nigeria with all her abundant natural resources cannot boast of water or sanitation to the majority of the citizens. The urban poor rely on sachet water for drinking and buy jerry cans of water for their daily use. Now there is lock-down,we   are now left to see how they can afford it and how they can purchase enough to wash their hands often to check Covid-19,” he added.

Enejeta suggested that except adequate attention is paid to infrastructure provision, especially water for all, the pandemic will be hard to deal with as the ordinary people on the street cannot afford  to ‘waste water on frequent hand washing and sanitation’.

He maintained that no matter the level of advocacy carried out by the government the urban poor and rural dwellers cannot buy into the programme as their pockets cannot carry them.

Furthermore, he warned on community transmission, noting what a catastrophe it would if satellite towns in Lagos, the Federal Capital Territory, Kano or any other major town in Nigeria have an outbreak and what it would portend for the nation because of the neglect of policy makers to provide the needed infrastructure.

By Okwy Iroegbu-Chikezie

Real estate developers and financiers at a recent Property Investment Summit in Lagos, lamented the financing gaps in projects, stressing the need to unlock the potential of the sector.

Speakers agreed that financing, government regulations, multiple taxation and access to land, constituted major constraints to property development, saying except something was done urgently the housing gap would continue to exist, especially in the low income bracket.

They argued that developers, in the middle to upscale real estate market easily passed the various charges to their clients, which multiply by day as a result of government encumbrances without complaint  but noted that sadly same cannot be said of the low income group sector.

RCI Atlantis Managing Director Raymond Ihuoma said though he operated in the middle to high income sector, he was worried about the huge financing gap and how to bridge it. He said this was made worse by the high construction cost and materials as those in his segment imported almost every other thing to meet the taste of their clientele.

He called for a strategy that would  enable local manufacturing for construction to check the high cost of housing. According to him, it is difficult for the majority of the people to own houses as a result of the inclement investing climate and dearth of mortgage institutions.

CEO, Kairos Capital, Sam Chidoka, who  spoke on “Project finance and asset management”, urged developers on the need to operate effective debt structure in the development and operational cycle.  He advised on the utilisation short-term finance, bonds and development space.

On the place of loan in property development, he said it depended on the ability of the asset to pay back.

According to him, it is a company’s cash flow that will determine how it operates and the ability of an asset to pay back its debt.

He, however, criticised a situation where real estate funds are in double digit. He noted that the sector would not grow to the optimum because of long gestation period.

Group Head, Real Estate, Ecobank Capital, Kunle Osilaja, spoke on the need to create a sustainable city, be it residential, commercial or mixed development.

Citing Victoria Island, Lekki, Ikoyi  and how they were initially designed as residential areas before the influx of oil and gas firms from Portharcourt, he said developers had no choice but to take advantage of the influx and the taste of the target market to turn a greater percentage of these areas to commercial areas.

They maintained that except we deliberately create sustainable cities the sector’s growth would be stunted and not meet  global standards nor be competitive.

Echostone CEO Sammy Adigun spoke on his company’s vision of delivering 200,000 homes in five years and Green buildings. He mentioned  his company’s readiness to work with government in a conducive environment.

The United Nations Human Rights Commission in a March report  said about 1.8 billion persons are homeless globally. But, ironically, governments expect people to stay home to stem the spread of Covid-19.  Another report from Africa Union (AU) stated that about 20 million are expected to lose their jobs in Africa, of which Nigeria has a high percentage. In this report, OKWY IROEGBU-CHIKEZIE looks at its implication in rental payment.

TO United Nations (UN) Special Rapporteur on the Right to Adequate Housing, Leilani Farha, homes have rarely been more of a life or death.

Operators in the housing sector say if nothing is done urgently, more people may join the list of the homeless as they may not be able to pay their rents due to job loss and the dislocation  expected after the COVID-19 pandemic.

There are no fresh developments or construction as a result of the lockdown and some rents have expired since the beginning of the year, delaying the income of homeowners.  Findings revealed that while some real estate operators and homeowners were magnanimous to discount some months or offer moratorium, others gave reasons they must collect their rents the pandemic notwithstanding, insisting that the virus had also negatively impacted them in some ways.

A lawyer & property consultant, Nkem Ogonsiegbe, said moratorium by some landlords was commendable. However, he said some landlords were on the neck of their tenants to pay the balance of their rents having made part payments before the coronavirus lockdown.

He said: “How each landlord handles his own depends on the circumstances of the case as well as the landlord’s disposition. The attitudes of tenants play a part to an extent. There are tenants that are habitual debtors for one reason or another.

In such a situation you don’t normally expect a landlord to consider foregoing his rent. There are landlords who are naturally tight fisted and will demand their rent from their tenants even when they, the landlords, are well to do. As a lawyer I have cases in court against some tenants became of defaults in their rental payments.

Such tenants will still have to go through the court cases because their defaults were not due to coronavirus. I know tenants that see rent payments as a distraction. They take care of their other issues and needs but to pay rent becomes something that they do at their whims and caprices. Such tenants will have to face the process”.

He said though he was not averse to moratorium, he stressed that it depended on the disposition of landlords, the attitudes of tenants and the circumstances of the cases.

Stressing the need to treat each case on its merit, Ogonsiegbe recalled that for the past two years, he had a tenant that worked with NPA and was consistent with his rent payments as well as utility bills.  He said: “When he lost his job and was struggling to get another job I talked to the landlord to consider his situation and past attitude.

Till now, he’s still in the apartment with his family and pays in installments. This pandemic will also teach people the need to be mindful when relating with others either as a landlord or tenant”, he added.

Principal Partner, Kola Akomolede & co, Asiwaju Kola Akomolede,  said tenants who were due to leave by the end of March  had not done so while those who were supposed to move into the houses they have probably paid for before pandemic could not do so. He said this had led to outstanding rentals that must be collected.  He said it had caused some dislocations as surveyors and agents might not be able to reach some of them as a result of the lock-down.

President, Nigeria Institute of Building (NIOB), Kunle Awobodu said he expected landlords to show understanding with their tenants as some of them may have lost their jobs or had salary cuts.

Awobudu said the housing market was passing through a trying period when rent payment default was rampant because household income had been badly eroded by the coronavirus which has locked down economic and business activities.

A landlady, Mrs. Bola Fadeyi, said though the idea of ‘debt forgiveness’ sounded nice but she might not be able to do it. She said her four flats in Ajao Estate, Lagos were her only source of income as a retiree. According to her, people should prepare to discharge their social responsibilities of which rental is a major part of it and not look for excuses.

She said landlord and tenants were  impacted by the virus. She prayed for the government to have the wisdom to deal with the pandemic and thanked God that all her tenants paid in full before the advent of the pandemic.

Chief Ugo Chika, a landlord in Okota area of Lagos, said giving two or three months’ moratorium to his tenant will depend on the payment history of the said tenant.

He wondered how a ‘bad tenant’ would expect such understanding from his landlord when under good condition, he had always defaulted. He assured that the pandemic would not last and advised those who were in arrears to rally round and pay.

The building sector is fraught with challenges of collapse, quackery, substandard materials, abandonment and poor workmanship. Operators say poor supervision of the sector and near-lack of adherence to laid-down procedures are drawbacks to a virile sector. The Lagos State Government has picked up the gauntlet with the planned introduction of operating standards across the state, OKWY IROEGBU-CHIKEZIE reports

The building sector is one of the cornerstones of the economy as housing and related construction activities are classified as basic needs. Unfortunately, the sector is bedeviled with challenges, which have continuously undermined the realisation of its full potential. From outright collapse to dilapidation to substandard works, private and public stakeholders have noted the need for effective coordination and application of general standards to enhance the development of the sector. No doubt, the challenges were not borne out of dearth of laws, but more due to application of laws and standardisation of interpretation of legal guidelines and procedures.

The Public Procurement Act (PPA) emphasises competence, appropriate pricing, structured funding, usage of standard and quality materials as prerequisites for building in the public sector. Besides, buildings are expected to be designed to entrench quality, efficiency and safety in line with global best practices.

At a symposium on “Appropriate Procurement Methods: Ensuring Effective Building Production”, stakeholders, including the Lagos State Government, Nigerian Institute of Building (NIOB), and other practitioners brainstormed on the drawbacks and effective ways to strengthen the building sector.

One of the highlights of the event was the plan by the Lagos State government to introduce Standard Operating Procedure (SOP) for Ministries, Departments and Agencies (MDAs). The proposed SOP when operational will spell out the dos and don’ts for construction projects in the state, in compliance with applicable laws, executive orders, circulars and ministerial mandates. It will also outline responsibilities for the execution of projects as defined. Given the importance of Lagos as Nigeria’s economic centre and the state with the largest building activities, many stakeholders believe the proposed SOP may impact on national building operations and practices.

Members of the NIOB said rising inflation index on resources in the construction industry had led to reduction in business activities as it  impacts negatively on individual’s and corporate bodies’ purchasing powers and, by extension, reducing the appetite for new projects.

NIOB President Kunle Awobodu, who spoke on the causes of incessant building collapse, noted that the menace called for greater concerns. He urged authorities in the ministries of the Environment, Housing and Works, at the federal and state levels, to go back to the drawing board and come up with appropriate guidelines and regulations that would strengthen the ethics of the building profession.

He called on the Lagos State Government to continue to enforce the State Environmental Sanitation Laws and to ensure that those who construct illegal shanties on waterways or block drainage channels or canals are sanctioned appropriately, noting that flooding portends a great danger to buildings.

Special Adviser to Governor Babajide Sanwo-Olu on Works and Infrastructure, Aramide Adeyoye,  regretted that the sector had been riddled with incessant collapse and other problems occasioned by the use of substandard materials, quackery and, in particular, failure of practitioners to imbibe appropriate procurement methods.

Adeyoye lamented that building collapse was often accompanied by loss of lives and properties, urging builders to use the opportunity of the symposium to chart a course for a more-professional way of building that would be safe and compliant with international best practices.

According to her, the usage of appropriate procurement methods helps the client, public or private, to ensure and promote sustainable developments by utilising available resources in the most-efficient, transparent and ethical manner.

The PPA, she noted, helps in minimising cost through effective competition, protection of public funds; timely delivery of quality projects at the right price, and provide a high level of satisfaction for users.

Recognising the impact of professional builders in ensuring safety and standard in the built environment, she appealed to them to use the platform to support and partner with the Lagos State Government in her efforts at ensuring a built environment where accountability, transparency, professionalism and quality of the procurement process are the watchwords.

According to her, adherence to the PPA is a success factor as the law was designed as a catalyst for success, a recipe for growth and the bedrock of sanity in every area of public procurement, especially as it affects the construction sector.

“As stakeholders who understand the inherent dangers in cutting corners, I urge you to continue to collaborate and cooperate with Lagos State government as she strives to nip the incidences of building collapse in the bud. Build appropriately with good building methods, weed out quacks and report illegal developments.This is the way forward, it will help us to protect our individual and collective integrity,” Adeyoye said.

Vice Chairman, Nigerian Institute of Building (NIOB), Lagos Chapter, Sunday Wusu, said sound procurement would successfully help in the completion of projects on schedule and at right cost for stakeholders without recourse to arbitration or litigation.

He called on professionals to see appropriate procurement methods in its true light and recognise the distinction between different procurement methods for different projects which would help in arriving at the best options for each project.

According to him, appropriate procurement methods, when holistically analysed at inception and put to use, will undoubtedly help in reducing, if not eliminating, cost overrun that comes from extension of time due to unforeseen mistakes by the various stakeholders on such projects.

“All professionals in the sector must see appropriate procurement methods in its true light and must recognise the distinction between different procurement methods for different projects which will, ultimately, help in arriving at the best options for each project,” Wusu said.

He advised practitioners to align themselves with procurement methods that would enable them to effectively manage their time-tested and valued building production processes according to best global ethics.

He noted that across the world, it is generally believed that the success of a construction project is largely dependent upon the type of procurement method applied.

On what influences the choice of a procurement mode, Wusu listed factors such as project starting and finishing time, need to foster control, project size, risk management, and price uncertainty due to time consideration, technical complexity, quality control, administrative complexity, and familiarity with the procurement method.

He, however, added that no single method had all the solutions to procurement challenges, but rather consultants and professionals needed to continually update their knowledge on the suitability of one method over another for varying projects to enable them guide their clients aright.

Wusu noted that attaining building production required design and construction document, client’s goal for the project and government’s requirement while cost management at site entailed usage of scarce resources for optimum benefits.

“The design and execution of a project should produce maximum value for money. This is because the cost of capital is high and it is only operated for short term,” Wusu said.

On cutting down on corruption in the construction process, he charged his members on the need for fair play. According to him, in contract award, there should be fair play. Price though a significant criterion should not be the sole determinant or even the most-important factor in sensitive projects or in award of contract.

Other factors such as technical, financial and administrative capabilities should be evaluated at the prequalification stage. It should be given to the qualified bidder whose bid substantially conforms to the requirement set forth on the solicitation documents.

Underscoring the need for integrity in the process, Wusu noted that due process policy in contract awards was introduced to ensure the selection of the most-appropriate contractor to deliver construction projects as specified so that the best value for money is ensured.

He lamented that, in spite of this due process policy, project delivery in the country had been characterised by inefficiencies that lead to poor quality and time and cost overrun.

Chairman, Nigerian Institute of Building (NIOB), Lagos, Adelaja Adekanmbi, earlier dwelt on the need to check corruption and maintain integrity in the procurement and construction processes.

He said honesty in procurement processes, which should reflect in cost and successful completion of projects on schedule, and at the right cost to all stakeholders without recourse to arbitration or litigation, was lacking in the country.

He asked builders to align themselves with procurement methods that would effectively lead to building production processes that are in compliance with global ethics.

He stressed that zero per cent accident can be achieved at construction sites if corruption was eliminated. Adekanmbi advised professionals to avoid being used by government or her agencies to perpetrate corrupt practices.

The NIOB chief canvassed appropriate time management and sticking to programme schedule in the building process, stating that if all these were adhered to the sector would be robust and grow the economy.

He assured that NIOB would contribute to addressing building collapse, noting that the institute was working to further contribute its professional expertise towards optimising the gains of appropriate procurement methods for effective building production processes.