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By Emeka Onyebuchi
Maintenance can broadly be defined as “work undertaken in order to keep or restore every facility i.e. every part of a site, building and content to an acceptable standard,” Ivor H. Seeley 1976. Furthermore, acceptable standard relates to what sustains the utility and value of the facility and this would by all means include some degree of improvement over the life of the building as acceptable comfort and amenity standards, ordinary cleaning is part and constituted part of the maintenance activity, BS 3811. The beauty and continuity of any facility to give utility is its state of repair.
Let us look at the building maintenance in this write up. It has been discovered in recent days that the poor state of building structures in Lagos State and indeed the country as a whole and the cry of poor maintenance culture in the society cuts across all built-up facilities. But looking at buildings or housing accommodation, the story is very sad and multi-dimensional.
These days, the rate and frequency of building collapse is very rampant and frequent. Some are quite fatal while others are not, in terms of loss of human lives but the loss of financial/ material resources is quite huge. The government ministries at both state and federal levels have been very concerned on this and have taken various actions and enacted various policies to put in check those calamities and losses.
There is no smoke without fire as it is always said. The building collapses and poor maintenance mentioned above is just one aspect of the major problems we encounter in the building industry today. But because of the fatality that goes with it at times and huge material and financial resources that go with it, there is a loud public cry and outrage on building collapse. But there are several dysfunctional activities going on in the building and construction industry which have made mess and put to question of late to the integrity and understanding of our building professionals. However, much as we need qualified and highly skilled building/construction engineers to build a house project, we need technicians and middle level technical staff to ensure that the building facility is kept in efficient and effective functional state.
This is where the big problem lies. In Nigeria today, there are very few technical manpower at the lower cadre. In other words, there are few maintenance providers such as plumbers, electricians, refrigerator/air-condition technicians, professional cleaners, light technicians and attendants like gardeners fitters, aluminum/ metal workers, tillers, painters, carpenters, joinery, bricklayers, among others.
In reality, real estate practitioners and those in construction industry are frustrated when they cannot get experienced good artisans for example tillers, to tile the floors and walls of a building being constructed or being refurbished. It is disheartening to note that we have to import ordinary tillers or painters from the neighboring West African countries to do our maintenance jobs in our buildings. I was personally appalled when a local tiller was engaged to tile a property being renovated by my client. Not only were the tiles not well aligned, the white cement was left on the surface of the tiles to dry up. At the end of the day, the surface of the wall was so rough like lizard screeded wall. The tiles had to be broken off and retiled by an artisan from Togo with the consequential waste of money and materials. It is no more news that most of our contractors, engineers and builders have artisans or middle cadre technicians from Benin Republic, Togo and Ghana doing the technical jobs for them. If you want a good and neat job done for you; go to Ghana, Benin Republic, Togo and other West African coast to get technicians.
I remember in one drainage project, we were doing in our estate (construction of drainage gutters), we engaged a fellow Nigerian local technician who gave estimate of several bags of cement and various sizes of iron rods. The materials were provided and he did the gutter/drainage construction. Only one rain, the drainage collapsed. We had to start all over again but this time around to a middle level headed mason from Benin Republic who came to our rescue and for the past 11 years, we are good with the drainage and there have not been any problems since.
The story is not different in painting. If one has a painting job to do, it would be very difficult to get a good Nigerian young man who does painting. They will come and tell you they are painters… but engage them, they will waste your paint and give you a horrible job and fight you to be paid for the poor job done.
Is it mason, roof, iron/metal works, refrigeration/air-conditioning job. The result is not different.
Yet we have thousands of youths in our streets milling around without job. There is therefore a very urgent need to look into our academic curricular and the need to revisit our technical schools. We used to have technical schools and trade centers where these crafts-men were trained with skills in masonry, electrical, tilling, technical drawings/building plan drawing. We would be able to bring the good old days back where those who passed out from trade centers can handle a lot of things in building construction from building plan drawing to block moulding, bricklaying to the areas of electrical installations, plumbing works/pop installations and a whole lot more.
The value of properties is directly affected when the maintenance aspect is poor. If the facilities and services in a property is poorly maintained or in a state of disrepair, obviously, the value will drop and this is bad for any investor in real estate services
Even cleaning and gardening can bring down the value of property in a state of disrepair. Obviously, the value will drop and this is bad for any investor in real estate. As said earlier, service as simple as cleaning can bring down the value of property down in no small way. For example I have a true live experience of inspection with one ex-top military brass in Nigeria who wanted to buy a house. By the time we got to the office of the principal agent selling the property, my client refused to sit down because he said their office was dirty right from the reception to the principal agent’s office. The chairs, the smell and poor arrangement put him off. It took me a lot of skill to persuade him not to abort the transaction. We eventually conducted the inspection though. This sends a strong message in a micro level!
What is being said here is that simple things being over-looked in real estate maintenance and marketing convey great impressions to prospective clients and the value it gives to buildings and facilities cannot be ignored. Imagine yourself entering into a facility/building where the floral ornamental gardens are well manicured and maintained and another facility well-built though but with the floral ornamental gardens bushy and unattended even when the building is of state-of-the-art, it will not convey a good impression and good value. The simple job of a common gardner can enhance the value of a building. Therefore, gardening and horticultural jobs play very vital role in value creation and enhancement. My colleague has a friend from Ghana who is a horticulturist. He makes millions of naira annually from the contract of cleaning and horticulture while our young men in Nigeria are looking down on it and missing opportunities My Ghanaian friend is a millionaire in Nigeria doing his horticulture and cleaning jobs.
This article is all about the need to have trained artisans, craftsmen, middle level technicians in the building construction industry to bring about the functional and high value property in our state, nay in Nigeria.
A high skilled and experienced medical doctor, say a surgeon cannot function well without the auxiliary medical technical staff like theatre nurse, anastasian, theatre attendants; those who clean the stables, those who turn on and turn off the lights and a whole lot of support staff to make his surgery successful. This is exactly what happens in the building industry. No matter how skillful and knowledgeable a building engineer or property manager can be, he needs a whole lot of cooperation from experienced and high skilled and dedicated craftsmen and artisans to deliver. These include plumbers, electricians, painters, tillers, fitters, air-conditioner technicians roofing technicians; refuse collectors, cleaners, security guards and all others.
We have found out over time that the above middle class manpower is lacking in Nigeria. There is need to address it now. If not, we may be importing technicians from our neighboring countries. This will not augur well with us in the real estate sector.
