Bennett Oghifo
The new Chairman of the Estate Surveyors and Valuers Registration Board of Nigeria (ESVARBON), Chief Dosu Fatokun has said they would enforce the Act setting up the Board to ensure there is proper valuation of assets and regulation of real estate and facility management practice in the country.
Fatokun stated this after a formal handing over ceremony by the immediate past Chairman, EVS Gershom Henshaw, in Abuja, recently.
Fatokun said he would build on the legacies of his predecessors, and that he would “want to see whether we’re occupying, effectively, the legal space given to us by Decree 24, 1975, that is, CAP 111. That is the law that confers recognition to ESVARBON.
“We are supposed to supervise, nurture a number of academic disciplines, professional disciplines. For example, property management, facility management. So, I want to see how effective we have been occupying that space. If you look at the Nigerian economy today, if there’s anything that gives us joy is that the Nigerian Stock Exchange has been doing well since the past one year, in fact over 100% increase, look at the capitalization that’s the total investment in exchange. This total capitalization represents land and buildings, land and machinery that are invested in this economy. If you look at our setup, we have a lot to do. We cannot only value them for a number of purposes, we also have to manage them. So I want to see how far we are registering our presence in these aspects. For example, MTN went to exchange last year, the same thing with transcorp power.
“These companies are supposed to have their assets valued. Are our colleagues doing their best here? In the 1970s, 1980s when we had the indigenization decree, and when the companies came out with their prospectus, you will see that the assets of these companies were valued by Hope Harriman and Co., Gershom Henshaw and Co., do we still have that today? So, we don’t want to be relegated. So the legitimate legal space given to us we want to occupy effectively.
“When the tenure kickstarts with my fellow board members we would have some other suggestions too, and the outgoing chairman too will see he’s still in position to give us other suggestions.
About quackery, he said, “It’s a perennial challenge, Number one, what I just mentioned about occupying our territory effectively is again a way of containing quackery and when we talk of quackery, it is not only the local ones, there can be quackery from abroad.”
He said they also intend to regulate facility management. “We thank God that here a prominent member of this board has been the past president of the facility management association and members are here too because these things overlap. Because what we’re talking about as facility management today is an extension of property management, which we have been doing for years. It’s an extension of property management so we want to move from the positive side.
Fatokun said they would put in place what he called “Reciprocity,” meaning they would liaise with other similar institutions outside Nigeria for their development.
