Town planners across the country have been charged to uphold standard and be professional in order to tackle the challenges faced in urban planning and the development of the country.
The minister of Works and Housing, Babatunde Fashola who gave the charge while inaugurating Town Planners Registration Council of Nigeria (TOPREC) in Abuja yesterday, said the purpose of the re-constitution of the council was to ensure proper, effective and efficient town planning that would bring about more development in the sector and Nigeria as a whole.
He said it was also to ensure that the country has a professional council that would in turn ensure that the professional Town Planners are registered as members of the Council.
Fashola called on the states to join forces with the council to ensure a well planned environment capable of changing the face of the country for better living.
The minister further urged the council to work together with relevant stakeholders in order to achieve the feat it sets out to achieve, while lamenting the long stay in office of the former council members.
Describing their tenure as inordinate tenure, the minister urged the new members to brace up and meet the yearnings of the built industry.
Fashola who said the country has town planning lesson to learn from the COVID-19 pandemic, informed that Experts have warned that there may be another pandemic. He therefore urged town planners to always consider the position of living in the event of pandemic in their planning and execution. He encouraged the town planners to be at their best in the task of building a good and acceptable environment.
Earlier, in his welcome address, the permanent secretary of the ministry, Bashir Nura Alkali said the Minister in exercise of his powers approved the re-constitution of the new Members to the Council, following the expiration of the tenure of the former ones in consonance with the provision of Section 2 (1) of the Town Planners Registration Council of Nigeria (TOPREC) Act 2004.
He said TOPREC is a critical Agency of Goverment under the supervision of the Federal Ministry of Works and Housing with the statutory mandate to regulate and control the practice of the profession of Physical Planning in all its aspects and ramification in Nigeria which includes determining who are town planners, the knowledge and skills required for registration of persons seeking to become members of the profession of town planning.
The permanent secretary further stated that the Council is also responsible for securing the establishment and maintenance of a register of persons entitled to practice as Town Planners in Nigeria
According to him, “having well-disciplined and adequately regulated professionals in the built environment will in no small measure improve the quality of output of these professionals and invariably contribute to the quality of our environment, construction, Infrastructure and national development”,.
Continuing, he said, “given the qualities and experiences of all the new members of the Council and Management of the Town Planners Registration Council of Nigeria (TOPREC), here today for the inauguration, the Country is assured of efficient and effective delivery in town planning in Nigeria”,.
On his part, the President of TOPREC, Town Planner Isiaku Mukhtar Kura pledged the commitment of the council, while assuring Nigerians of better built environment.
He encouraged the members to form a habit to read and meditate on the Act that established the council, while explaining that being members of the council was a call to service that would involve sacrificing their time and resources.
Kura who conveyed the council’s gratitude to the Minister for the periodic subvention given to it, also informed the Minister that the Council has been able to build a Secretariat at Jahi district in Abuja.
The twelve TOPREC members inaugurated are ;Tpl Dr. Simon Kanobi -Osoww Ajom, Cross River State, Tpl Danbaba Umar Idris, v Niger state, Tpl. Liman Gana, Borno State, Tpl. Ogunlewe Adebisi Adesoga, Lagos state, Tpl Aniekan Ubong Akpan Cross River, Tpl. Davies Tonte Joseph, Rivers State, Tpl. Aliyu Abubakar Mohammad, Jigawa state and Tpl Ogbugo Victor Filzgerald representing Delta state.
