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President Goodluck Jonathan has been charged to fix Nigeria’s decaying infrastructure without which overall economic development will elude the country.
This charge was given in Abuja by the president of the Nigerian Society of Engineers (NSE), Chief Olumuyiwa Alade Ajibola, during a media briefing with the theme: The route to prosperity and prosperity.
Chief Ajibola insisted that unless Nigeria takes the right route by evolving strategies that would facilitate development, vision 20:2020 would be a mirage.
He further stated that “as at today, the Nigerian citizenry has become alert enough to expect the same high quality service from government, business and non-profit sectors. In this regard, therefore Nigerian Engineers believe that Mr President must adopt strategies that will ensure that both the public servant working in government agencies and the agency itself as a whole must perform to their maximum capacity in order to fulfil government’s minimum responsibilities to the citizenry.”
Continuing, Chief Ajibola said “the president must now define a dynamic vision to inspire and mobilise the public and private sectors and usher in an organisational change process that will rapidly see Nigeria renounce and discard its old self and become a better place and people.
“He should very soon provide a clear vision of all the sectors in the next four years and in the distant future, and not just a few sectors,” he added.
Furthermore, President Jonathan was tasked to, for the sake of performance, and quality service to the citizenry, constitute his cabinet with at least 60 percent technocrats and 40 percent politicians, adding that he should demystify the senate screening exercise by attaching portfolios to those nominated for ministerial appointments.
“He has to believe in and tap into the capacity of Nigerians and Nigeria for rebirth and renewal as already witnessed in the entertainment, communications, banking and others. This trend needs to be urgently replicated in the infrastructure and other economic sectors and sustained,” Ajibola said.
According to him, the power reform roadmap needs urgent review so that it can find relevance within the Energy Development master plan of 2007, pointing out that the consolidated energy document should be passed to the National Assembly for enactment into an energy law, which would make it mandatory for every successive administration to implement.
Specifically, Ajibola said “the nation should not play politics with the power sector (also the industries, transport, water, oil and gas sectors) appoint competent engineering professionals to pilot the sector and other heavy engineering based sectors.
“This is the case with ministries of Justice and Health, in respect of lawyers and medical practitioners. Mr President should ensure that the process of privatisation of the power sector should take into consideration the essence of Nigerian content development,” he affirmed.
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