The dangers posed by incompetent and unqualified personnel handling housing construction in the country was highlighted on Wednesday during the graduation of 18 building artisans and technicians and the matriculation of new intakes by the Adeyinka Technical Institute in Lapeleke, Ogun State.
The Director, Ogun State Ministry of Education Science and Technology, Mr. Abidemi Bammeke, said most construction engineers and artisans in the country were not well trained to build strong houses
Bammeke advised that technical skills acquisition should be encouraged in the country to enhance the quality of buildings.
He said, “The major bane of building collapse in the country is that we don’t have competent and qualified craftsmen, technicians and engineers. We have not fully baked our craftsmen to really do the work. We have also not fully baked our technicians to supervise the craftsmen; and incidentally, the engineers are not willing to put in efforts at making our structures become very solid and lasting.
“All of us must take to skill acquisition to ensure that trainees are well grounded and taught. We must reduce the level of theory and increase the level of practicality in the field so that when the trainees are well tutored, they will do jobs that will stand the test of time.”
Bammeke wondered why Technical and Vocational Education was abandoned, noting that it was key to ensuring skills acquisition for the construction sector.
“Acquisition of veritable skills is applicable to construction, fabrication, production, maintenance and servicing sectors. TVE is not a collection of non-creative individuals and people of low comprehension or for people who had tried their hands on other fields of specialty but did not succeed,” he added.
The Proprietor ATI and Chairman/Chief Executive Officer, Sparklight Group, Chief Toyin Adeyinka, said the institute aimed at impacting practical knowledge and empowering indigent people to become gifted artisans.
He said, “The institute was set up as a non-fee paying technical school to train technicians and craftsmen in the most practical manner possible with a view to meeting up the huge shortfall of these set of professionals in our society. Great emphasis is placed on hands-on practical training and dignity of labour.
“The affiliation of the school to a construction company and other industrial companies has made this objective less cumbersome. Our admission policy is mostly targeted at indigent students, whose parents are unable to pay their school fees.”
Adeyinka said each of the graduating students had the unique opportunity of participating in the development of the school complex and other construction projects; thus giving them first hand practical experience in their chosen courses of specialisation.
“It is my hope that these new intake will participate in building our permanent site. Each graduating student is expected to execute projects that will demonstrate their competency in their fields of specialisation,” he said.
The 18 graduating students were trained on construction, plumbing, furnishing/carpentry, welding and steel fabrication.
One of the graduating students, Mr. Boniface Samuel, commended the efforts of ATI to ensure professionalism in the country by training artisans in different fields.
November 26, 2012 by Sodiq Oyeleke
Written by NEWSTRAWL ONLINE UPDATE
Sodiq Oyeleke is a Media, Human Resources, Project Management and Public Relations Practitioner
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