•Engages AIHS for effective plg advocacy
The Nigerian Institute of Town Planners, Dr Chime Ogbonna, has inaugurated a colloquium committee on the implementation of the 1992 Urban and Regional Planning (URP) Law (CAP 138, Laws of the FRN, 2004).
The colloquium aims to bring together a gathering of stakeholders to talk about the Nigerian Urban and Regional Planning Law and its implementation during the NITP’s national/international conference.
Stakeholders in the built sector, members of parliament, governors, local government chairmen, community-based organizations and non-governmental organizations, among others, are expected to be at the colloquium.
The colloquium, according to the National President of the Nigerian Institute of Town Planners, Dr Chime Ogbonna, is a continuation of the NITP’s commitment to ensuring that the Nigerian URP Law is fully domesticated across the states of the federation and implemented.
It will be recalled that right at the investiture of the present NITP administration in December last year, Ogbonna informed the town planners and the public of the imperativeness of this.
The planned colloquium is one of the veritable tools of advocacy and engagement. This will take place in the nation’s capital city of Abuja, where the policies and politics of national affairs and nation-building take place.
“But what is indeed at stake is the imperativeness of getting the law implemented. We need this to have the legal impetus to get things done. Operating without a legal framework is like walking and working in darkness without a guide and guard. The law provides the legal compass to direct us; the legal structure for planning administration in the country. The law is what should be on our lips until we get it implemented,” the president said.
The colloquium committee is being led by Onibokun Abimbola.
Other members include Dr. Moses Ogunleye; Mukhtar Usman Galadima; Chinyere Omeh; Emeka Oko; Dr. Chinwe Ekwuribe; Barr Udegbunam Obioma; Barr. Fumi Osifuye; Mercy Ayuba and lBarr. Festus Adebayo as special adviser.
Meanwhile, the NITP president had paid a courtesy visit to the founder/convener of the Abuja International Housing Show, Festus Adebayo, to further strengthen the relationship between the two organisations, which has blossomed over the years.
The visit aimed at exploring more ways of promoting planning advocacy in the country.
In a statement by the spokesperson of NITP, Dr CJ Nor: “It was a robust engagement at the end of the day, as useful ways of promoting planning advocacy at the national, regional, and local levels were discussed.
“Both organizations also talked about ways of promoting publicity at the forthcoming Abuja International Housing Show in July, and the NITP international conference taking place in October this year.”
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