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From Isaac Anumihe, Abuja
The Quantity Surveyors Registration Board of Nigeria (QSRBN) has attributed the ongoing disagreement between contractors and Federal Government officials over Variation of Prices (VOP) to unqualified persons handling the costing of government projects.
President of QSRBN Obafemi Onashile disclosed this while speaking on the sidelines of the 2024 Annual Assembly of the board and induction of newly registered quantity surveyors in Abuja. He lamented that professionals trained to handle infrastructure costings are not involved in costing projects.
According to him, if the budgeting and costing are done by someone unqualified, there will be problems.
“We have situations where accountants are doing budgets for infrastructure projects. We have situations where engineers are doing budgets for infrastructure projects.
“These are not professionals that are trained and given licences to do costings for projects.
“Let the requisite professionals do the costing such that adequate budgeting is made for the project. When adequate budgeting is made, the project will be executed successfully without any interest or abandonment,” he said.
Onashile noted that because the professionals were not carried along at the inception of costing the projects, funding often becomes the problem.
“As I said earlier, funding is the major reason why there could be abandonment of projects. Now, the other issue is if the funding is inadequate.
“One, I said it must be provided. Two, it must be monitored,” he further explained.
The quantity surveyor said the major challenges facing quantity surveying professionals are the lack of patronage and commissioning of members in government projects.
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“There were challenges before I assumed office, and upon my assumption of office, I’m also tackling them.
“One of the major challenges is the lack of patronage and commissioning of members of quantity surveyors in government projects. And we believe that this is not only a deficiency to quantity surveyors but even to other professionals in the construction industry.
“And so, the first major challenge is getting work, getting commissions for quantity surveyors.
“The second challenge is the perceived lack of full understanding of the importance of quantity surveyors. Quantity surveyors’ contribution to the economy of the nation is enormous. And that’s one of the reasons why we have chosen the theme for this year’s annual assembly.
“The way we’ve done it is to showcase the capacity and capabilities of quantity surveyors in contributing to the economy and for the government to understand this and ensure that they get quantity surveyors to adequately contribute.
“The contribution of quantity surveyors to the economy is exponential compared to the compensation or remuneration of the quantity surveyors. It is the government and the nation that will bear the fruits of those kinds of commissioning of quantity surveyors.
“So that’s another challenge, to get the understanding, disseminate the proper understanding to the government,” he noted.
On how the challenges could be addressed, Onashile noted that one way of addressing them is to patronise quantity surveyors.
“We are communicating with the government about the awareness of quantity surveyors.
“Two, we’re also enabling the government, the ministries, to speak out. Because we do realise that there’s a division of governance.
“You have the legislature, you have the executive, and you have the judiciary. And there must be synergy amongst the three. Where one is holding down the other — the legislature holding down the executive in performance — it is to the detriment of the nation and the citizens,” Onashile noted.
