By Isqil Najim
Nigerian engineers have been warned that they risk losing control of their industry’s value chain unless they urgently move beyond traditional design and supervision into commerce, wealth management, and digital infrastructure.
This was the central message at the 2026 Annual Business Luncheon of the Nigerian Society of Engineers (NSE), Ikeja Branch, held recently in Lagos. Industry leaders, policymakers, and professionals gathered under the theme, “Reclaiming the Built Environment Value Chain: Strengthening Standards, Regulation, and Investment in Nigeria’s Construction Ecosystem.”
The event was chaired by the President of the NSE Engr Ali Rabiu represented by immediate past President of the NSE, Engr. Margaret Aina Oguntala. In his opening address, Engr. Rabiu challenged the engineering community to think decisively beyond their technical mandates. He identified financial literacy, business intelligence, and strategic thinking as skills that have become as professionally indispensable as engineering knowledge itself.
The President said that the construction sector despite being one of the drivers of national GDP and employment, continues to lose economic ground because its practitioners are inadequately equipped to navigate regulatory, financial, and business frameworks.
The Managing Director of Inclusive Concrete and Engineering Limited, Engr. Misbau Opeyemi Aminu, while speaking as the Guest Speaker, warned that engineers stand the risk of losing the value chain of their industry permanently.
Aminu, pointed out that Construction accounts for only 3.5 percent of Nigeria’s GDP while agriculture still commands 22 percent. “This should be a challenge to engineers who are supposed to reverse the trend and make Nigeria a tech-developed country.”
“After life, the air we breathe, the water we drink, nothing is more important than engineering.. nothing would be without engineers.” The problem, he noted, is not the profession’s importance. It is the profession’s absence from the commercial heart of its own industry.
Aminu, using concrete industry as an example, said that the engineering profession has allowed this foundational material to be surrendered almost entirely to unqualified technicians. “I can say confidently that 80 percent of our concrete processing is done by the quacks.” “For as long as we leave concrete to incapable hands, buildings and projects will continue to fail.”
Engr. Aminu, who is also the Vice President of Advocacy at the Lagos Chamber of Commerce and Industry (LCCI), recalled how Pharmacists once confined themselves to laboratories and manufacturing plants, ceding drug retail and distribution almost entirely to unlicensed traders. Until they changed direction and responded by lobbying the National Assembly to restrict drug retailing and distribution to licensed practitioners. The result was that pharmacists reclaimed approximately 95 percent of retail drug outlets in Nigeria, restored professional integrity,
He challenged the NSE Ikeja Branch to work with other branches to approach the Lagos State House of Assembly for legislation creating a formal concrete industry, one in which qualified engineers control precast production, drainage infrastructure, retaining walls, electricity poles, culverts, and building elements.
“If civil engineers take over the most important part of their value chain in the construction industry, it will restore professional integrity in construction, improve the well-being of many practitioners, and protect life and property.”
On commercial side, Engr. Aminu challenged engineers across all disciplines to move into product trading within their sectors. Chemical engineers should be trading in chemicals, where NAFDAC already requires professional signatures on import licences. Mechanical engineers should be entering the distribution of parts and supplies. “Nothing is derogatory in trading. And it is very, very lucrative.”, he stressed.
He warned that the new generation will not wait indefinitely for reform. They are impatient, financially focused, and competitive. If engineering’s leadership delays, the profession’s next generation will find other paths. “If our leaders take that step today, a few years down the line we would have taken substantial parts of our value chain.”
Also speaking at the event, Engr. Ganiyu Olatunji Oseni, Special Adviser to the Governor of Lagos State on Technology, Broadband, and Innovation, in his Keynote Address on behalf of the Lagos State Government stated that Nigeria’s built environment can no longer be conceived, designed, or governed in isolation from digital infrastructure. And that engineers who fail to grasp this transition risk designing cities that are obsolete before they are completed.
He described a new phase of global urban development in which physical construction and digital connectivity must be engineered as a single, integrated system from the earliest planning stages.
Engr. Osenisaid that the state government now treats broadband infrastructure with the same strategic seriousness historically reserved for motorways and drainage networks.
“Investors today do not only ask whether a city has roads. They ask whether the city has reliable connectivity and strong data infrastructure.”
Earlier in her address, Engr. Nimot Muili, Chairman of the NSE Ikeja Branch identified declining technical execution, the marginalisation of qualified local engineers, weak institutional enforcement, and insufficient capital injection as critical factors currently undermining the safety and economic viability of Nigeria’s infrastructure.
The highlights of the event was launching of the Branches Career Acceleration Programme (NiCAP) by the Distinguished Guest of Honour, Prof. Oluwatoyin Ashiru, Pro-Chancellor and Chairman of Council at Olabisi Onabanjo University. Prof. Ashiru expressed hope that the initiative would produce globally competitive engineers, successful entrepreneurs, innovative problem solvers, and transformational leaders for Nigeria and beyond.
The NSE Ikeja Branch Career Acceleration Programme (NiCAP) is a structured initiative developed by the branch’s Resource Portal and Job Desk (RPJD) Committee, led by Engr Peter Ogunbowale, designed to systematically close the gap between academic training and professional competence. The programme covers technical development, business practice, digital literacy, and entrepreneurship, with the aim of producing engineers who are not only employable but capable of building their own enterprises.
Among those present were Engr. Ademola Olorunfemi 29th NSE President, Engr. Tokunbo Ajanaku, National Chairman, Nigerian Institution of Civil Engineers (NICE); Engr. Rose Madaki, former NSE Vice President; Engr. Idiat Amusu, fourth President of the Association of Professional Women Engineers of Nigeria (APWEN); QS okwukwe Faith Ezeugoh, Chairman Association of Quantity Surveyors in Contracting Organisations, Engr Sunday Asade MD/CEo Meyers Pls, ENgr Kamal Gbadamosi, Engr Akin Akiola CEO WNM Ltf,Engr. Francis Oguamanum, fourth Chairman of the NSE Ikeja Branch; Engr. Ayo Fanimokun, fifth Chairman of the NSE Ikeja Branch; Engr Ali Akintola, Interim National Chairman NIProcE, Engr Funmilade Akingbagbohun, Past National Chairman NIIMechE and others
“After God created, Engineers are the next creator”
Engr Igbuan Ifidon
Engineers going in the business of their profession is long overdue.
NSE, COREN, government at all levels should be encouraged to be supportive in this project.
This is the only way to economic and academic development
absolutely. That is way to empower engineers