Worried by the high rate of decline in Nigerian cities due to a lack of planning and insufficient manpower and equipment to enforce plans, the Nigerian Institute of Town Planners (NITP) has called on the government at both the federal and state levels to declare a state of emergency on the nation’s unplanned urban environments.
Justifying the call at a press conference organised by the institute, titled “Plan Well and Live Well”, the President of NITP, Mr Nathaniel Atebije, decried the state of Nigerian settlements, saying they have been riddled with uncoordinated developments because of a lack of physical planning.
The absence of planning, he said, had exposed the nation’s settlements and their inhabitants to environmental, social, and economic challenges such as insecurity, poor infrastructure, vulnerability to the effects of climate change, disasters, impunity, and compromised and conflicting land uses.
“An unplanned settlement is an unsafe settlement. The absence of planning dictates confusion, chaos, and anarchy.
“The root of every success lies in planning. It is worthy of note that one of the guaranteed fundamental rights of citizens as provided in the constitution is the provision of security. Therefore, for this right to be ensured, towns, cities, and rural areas must be planned,” Atebije said.
He pointed out that effective city development started with planning carried out by qualified and licensed professional town planners, and that its development is controlled by statutory authorities well-equipped with relevant manpower and technical ability to respond to incursions before they reach sympathy levels.
According to him, planning should be taken as the first fruit of the dividends of democracy, adding that “citizens must demand the planning of our cities since it is the bedrock of growth and development.
“It is more to be desired than asking for improvement in the minimum wage because wages amount to waste if the environment to enjoy them is poor,” he said.
Declaring a state of emergency on unplanned urban environments, Atebije urged the need to ensure that plans are reviewed by experienced consultants where they exist to meet contemporary needs and that required technical and professional manpower should be engaged by public authorities, while equipment needed to monitor and enforce expedited compliance should be provided to minimise the “development by destruction” syndrome in our cities.
“This is the right course to take to facilitate good and profitable development of human settlements,” he said
The NITP boss called on the Federal Government, which promised Nigerians “renewed hope,” to bring the hope alive through the physical planning of Nigerian living environments.
According to him, the federal authority should ensure full compliance with town planning and environmental laws and edicts to set up institutions to implement the Nigerian Urban and Regional Planning Law while reviewing the sections of the law that are running into a crisis of relevance.
He also urged all states to key into the pathway of the federal government by creating a specialised Ministry for Physical Planning.
He also called on the tertiary institutions offering courses in urban and regional planning to ensure that their programmes are fully accredited by the Town Planners Registration Council of Nigeria to minimise the pains and agonies that their products face upon graduation.
“We call on the Federal and State Ministries of Education to review the curriculum of secondary schools with a view to ensuring that geography is taught to give students a fair view of their environment as inputs to good governance, entrepreneurship, and investment possibilities.
“We call on proprietors of planning schools to adequately equip their departments with necessary tools for professional training,” he said
Atebije also canvassed sufficient funding for planning programmes to enable them to perform optimally.
“We also call for the harmonisation of the activities of NUC and the regulatory bodies of the professions to minimise the frustrations that our young professionals are thrown into after graduating from their institutions.
“We call on all universities in the nation that offer planning education to ensure that their courses in urban and regional planning are fully accredited at any point in time,” he said.
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