The Council for the Regulation of Engineering in Nigeria (COREN) has lamented that Nigeria loses over N900 billion to foreign artisans and technicians due to shortage of Technical Education Manpower.
Engr Kashim Ali, President COREN who spoke on Thursday in Abuja at a Stakeholders Meeting on the State of Technical Colleges in Nigeria, with the Theme: Addressing the Crisis of Technical Manpower Shortage in Nigeria, lamented that 80% of masons, carpenters, steel fabricators, plumbers’ electricians, painters, and tillers found on construction sites across the country are foreigners from neighboring countries of Cameroun, Niger, Togo and Ghana.
Ali, noted that the dearth of indigenous artisans and technicians in the engineering sector was a major economic setback, “as the skill gap continues to widen, there has been huge capital flights as expatriates come in to fill the lacuna at the detriment of our country.”
He said skill gap developed gradually over the years due to retirement of aged artisans without young generation been groomed to take over from them.
“COREN is very concern about the paucity of indigenous technicians and craftsmen in the country. The council carried out a technical audit of over 300 technical colleges, 98% of the technical colleges visited were in very deplorable conditions, to which the council held a retreat in Calabar in 2013 to examine the status of technical education.
“Artisan and technicians constitute a very important component of the value chain in the engineering service delivery. We are here to take a pragmatic, but necessary step in the challenge of revamping technical education to save the engineering sector and Nigeria at large. Now is the time to work.”
In his welcome address, Minister of Power and Housing, Babatunde Fashola, represented by Engr Femi Amzat, expressed that there was the need to focus on “what makes an effective and responsive Technical and Vocational Education. We need to examine if our system is aligned with different types of skills required for continuing education growth.
“We can improve our aging infrastructure, provide sustainable jobs for our youths, and grow the economy by building a maintenance focused skilled acquisition system.
“Not that Nigeria do not have enough engineers, but a lot of them are not registered”, urging COREN to ensure it register more engineers.
“Nigeria is now investing heavily in infrastructure; in the 2016 budget capital allocation was N1.8 trillion, 30% of total budget. We are currently planning for these infrastructures that we are building. We are planning to build a second runway at some of our airports; this must be followed by a national maintenance plan,” he said.
“We must be thinking of a rail academy like Singapore to maintain and operate our new rail lines. We have to plan better for maintenance of our roads and bridges.”
Meanwhile, Chairman House Committee on Works, Honourable Toby Okechukwu, noted that the issue of Manpower Shortage in Nigeria was very auspicious that must be addressed and the challenges in technical education.
“It’s critical there is a reversal in the engineering. How come we don’t have enough engineers that can face our infrastructural issues in our country? There is a reverse pyramid where we have shortage of artisans, engineers that will drive the process of our creativity.
“It is an existential threat to our future if we fail to address the problem presently, it is in the best interest of engineers of COREN that will begin to do the needful.”
