The Governor of Rivers State Rt. Hon. Chibuike Rotimi Amaechi has advocated for proper and intensified survey for boundary demarcations in the country as such a need has become imperative due to their inputs and effectiveness of survey studies in development analysis.
The governor made this declarations while declaring open the on-going 2012 Survey Co-ordination Conference in Port Harcourt on Tuesday 3, September 2012 advising surveyors to be truthful in discharging their duties charging them never to allow politicians use them to move boundaries indiscriminately from their justified positions to other places due to ulterior motives.
Amaechi who frowned at the reckless shifting of boundaries in the Niger Delta everyday following oil well agitations said until surveyors take their stand and defend their profession territorial issues will continue to create problems and development will continue in the same vein to suffer setback in the nation.
In his speech, the Surveyor-General of the Federation, Prof. Peter C. Nwilo recognized that various reviews have been going on in the country today and that the survey sector of the economy should not be left out of the review train.
According to Prof. Nwilo, surveyors are producers of Geo-information for national development in all sectors and it is imperative that the act guiding the profession be examined and reviewed on regular basis in order to accommodate new development.
He has it that the review of the survey coordination act as a form of reform in surveying and mapping profession should be able to reposition the industry to be alive to responsibilities and make it more relevant in the national agenda as for sometime now the act has not been enforced.
Several respondents who spoke to journalists noted that so many state governors don’t know the value of survey and so they do not have office of Survey-General in their states and stay ignorant of their territory thereby forestalling development.
Some of the speakers pointed out that because proper surveys are not in place in the country people keep on remaining poor land owners who could have used their land to acquire money for personal capital investment. #####
Mene Gbarabe
