The Nigeria Society of Engineers (NSC) has berated Governor Ben Ayade of Cross River State and the Federal Government over what the engineering body described as marginalisation of its members in the award of contracts.
Branch chairman for the society in Cross River State, EngrAyip Nsed Akunjom raised the alarm while granting audience to journalists at the on-going workshop for the review of memorandum of article of association in Calabar yesterday.
The Engineers called on the Cross River State House of Assembly to be alive to its responsibility of ensuring that home-groomed engineers were not marginalised by state government when it comes to award of contracts.
A lecturer at the Federal University, Ikwo Funai, said “I am calling on the state House of Assembly to be alive to its responsibilities, if procurement is going to be done on construction on any design they should insist that home-groomed engineers be part of the process from beginning to the end.”
He lambasted the state government for the preference for Lagos-based and outside engineers against home-groomed engineers in relation to award of contracts adding that he was not nepotic but that the truth must be told.
“I have a duty to ensure that my members succeed even though I too needed to work hard to succeed in life. If today I want to build a bridge, and I know my father, my mother and kids would pass through that bridge I won’t compromise standard but outsiders could do that because the probability of he or she might not be there to pass through that bridge”
“As far as I am concerned, this government has not done well in the area of carrying engineers along. The truth must be told. I don’t want to put water in my mouth when I want to speak, I only pray that this statement would only spur and bring to the knowledge of the government that they need to work with engineers in the state,” he said.
“They owe Cross Riverians; they owe Nigerians and the people of this state that small privilege,” noting that government at all levels including the federal government hasn’t done well on issues pertaining to contract awards to home-groomed engineers.
Akunjom said it was wrong for any one to claim that home-groomed engineers lacked the requisite capacity and equipment to execute project, saying that any one who does so does that based on personal malice that he is having against the home-groomed engineers.
“If as a father you groom children on an issue and you turn round to tell people that your children are not good it is unfortunate. Let them search themselves, did they give engineers equipment? Did you give them the job? They didn’t give.”
The NSC Chairman, said that the Chinese who are executing virtually all the construction works in the state and Nigeria as a country didn’t go to the moon to get the expertise, adding that they were given opportunity by government of their country to prove their mettle before coming to Nigeria to do more.
He said that members of the society had been grossly marginalised regarding the superhighway and deep sea projects proposed by the Ayade-led administration.