By Emmanuel Elebeke & Favour Ulebor

THE bilateral  tie between Nigeria and Taiwan took a new dimension, when Taiwan Friends Association gathered at Chelsea Hotel, Abuja to share their technology  experience with Nigerians.

The idea, according to them was to ensure a smooth technology transfer from Taiwan to Nigeria as part of cushioning effects to aid Nigeria out of the economic recession.

It was indeed, an evening of fun and experience sharing for Taiwan Friends Association and the Taiwan Mission at the evening of sharing the technological partnership potential between Nigeria and Taiwan in various areas of endeavour.

Narrating  his study experience in Taiwan, a consultant, Architect Annas Kabiru Gaya,studied infrastructure development in Taiwan, said the difference between Nigeria and Taiwan in infrastructure development is that the later has a deliberate plan to develop new cities with new infrastructure, whereas, the former focuses mainly on old cities and existing infrastructure.

Gaya who said he learnt how to develop new cities opined that Nigeria can actually develop infrastructure wise by  developing new cities and by implementing a new infrastructure master plan that would bring a shift from the old norms.

“I went to Taiwan for a regular course on infrastructural development. They taught me basically how to develop news cities. I discovered that there are lot of ways a country can develop as far as infrastructure is concerned. There are lot of finances you can access. What I learnt is here in Nigeria, we always believe the government will provide through budgets, allocation, revenues but when I went to Taiwan, I realised that there are other private partnership you can do.

“We have some here but we don’t really patronise that kind of partnership. People don’t want to take risk, maybe because of the nature of our government policies and all other negative factors that are affecting us.