By Jude Njoku

Worried by the nation’s housing shortfall which is currently put at a staggering 16 million units, the Minister of Lands, Housing & Urban Development, Ms Ama Pepple has been told to urgently convey an all stakeholders retreat to x-ray and appreciate the magnitude of the problem confronting Nigeria housing industry and fashion out new ways of handling the challenges.

President of the Nigerian Institution of Estate Surveyors and Valuers, NIESV, Mr. Bode Adediji who made the call during a visit to the Minister in Abuja, explained that the proposed retreat will be coordinated by estate surveyors and valuers and other built-environment professionals.

Adediji who identified the factors hampering housing delivery as absence of workable and implementable housing policy and programme; access to land, absence of virile mortgage system and under-capacity of the construction sector, also called on the government to look into those bills, policy papers and programmes which have been submitted or put together for quite sometime now but have not received any concrete action.

The Nigerian Institution of Estate Surveyors and Valuers, NIESV, led by its president, Mr Bode Adediji last week paid a courtesy call on Minister of Lands, Housing & Urban Development, Ms Ama Pepple.

They include the proposed amendment to Land Use Act, the Mobogunje report and Land Administration and the National Building Code. Others factors affecting housing delivery, according to Adediji are reliance on imported building materials, absence of entrepreneurship, lack of political will to confront housing problem frontally and perennial policy somersault.

Policy somersault

He observed that Ms Pepple assumed duties as Housing and Urban development Minister at a time when the housing sector is “characterised by 16 billion housing deficit, sky-rocketing house and rental prices, and an abysmally poor sectoral contribution of less than 4 percent to the GDP”

The NIESV boss maintained that housing should no longer be seen as mere provision of shelters but indeed as an instrument of transforming not only our built-environment but indeed the entire sectors of our economy.

Noting that the present regime has identified areas of national priority in form of agenda particularly in the areas of power, security and infrastructure, Adediji posited that efforts in this priority sector can only be effective if the housing sector is not neglected or de-emphasised.

“One crucial issue that forms our proposed engagement with the current regime is the possibility of using the housing and construction sector to tackle the problem of youth unemployment in the country.

If a nation as big and resourceful as Nigeria can put the housing and construction matters in the front burner, this change will impact positively on the current alarming rate of youth unemployment.

It is therefore hoped that the housing and construction retreat being proposed would be woven around this noble objective of using the sector to empower Nigeria’s youth population,” he said.

Decrying the non-recognition of the services of estate surveyors and valuers, Mr.Adediji said: “ The Nigerian institution of estate surveyors and valuers (NIESV) as an Institution remains one of the most misunderstood, largely unappreciated, scantily utilised and minimally rewarded professions in Nigeria today. Indeed, the public and government perception of an estate surveyor and valuer does not transcend the notion of a mere estate agent”.

The NIESV boss who listed areas estate surveyors’ area of core-competence to include: land administration, urban planning and development, property valuation, facilities management, plant and machinery valuation, construction and project management and estate agency, maintained that “any tangible success in the areas of housing, property development and infrastructure cannot be attained without the involvement and contribution of estate surveyors”.

Responding, Ms Pepple said President Goodluck Jonathan has directed that any project proposal submitted by her Ministry must have the capacity to gainfully employ Nigerians.

She stated that all pending issues on housing, land and urban development matters, notably the review of land use act, prosecution of land and housing policy as well as rolling out of the National Building Code, NBC, would be properly reviewed and adequately implemented.

The Minister told the NIESV leadership to submit to her Ministry within two weeks, all areas of interest in the programmes, projects and activities of the ministry.