Lands CS Wahome vows to fight quacks in construction industry

Lands Cabinet Secretary Alice Wahome. [File, Standard]

Lands Cabinet Secretary Alice Wahome has directed the Board of Registration for Architects and Quantity Surveyors (BORAQS) to rein in on quacks in the construction industry.

Wahome said the quacks are to blame for several buildings that have collapsed across the country.

She said just like doctors, the construction sector comprises high-end professional architects, surveyors, land surveyors, planning firms, lawyers, engineers of all types of engineers and therefore whatever they do should be of high quality.

“These are high-end courses where the government invests heavily. If they are high-end, then it's for us to work very hard to be the people who put society in check. You have clients who want to cut corners. We have seen them, I have seen them myself in the legal profession,” said Wahome.

Wahome was speaking on Thursday when she officially opened the two-day Continuous Professional Development (CPD) at Safari Park in Nairobi with the theme; Artificial Intelligence(AI); Transforming The Built Environment, which was organised by BORAQS.

She said one of the questions she was faced with was what action she had taken or what she had done with the many buildings that were collapsing.

“One of the things I decided to do is to return the battle or the challenge to the members of government, to their constituents, to the people of Kenya. Because for a building to collapse, either there is compromise on professionalism, on materials, on execution or implementation of the project is completely wrong," she said.

"So the owner and the architect and the structural engineer and everybody in that list of project owners or the people who are implementing it cannot have a tick," CS Wahome added.

The CS also challenged the built environment professionals to become AI savvy.

She said Kenyans must first appreciate professionalism and it is for the architects to tell them what the specifications are because they know them including particular materials needed.

“If we build a 10-floor, a five-floor, a whatever building, it is going to collapse. If they choose shortcuts, you are not chained there. You can resign from the job. When interrogation comes, when the building collapses, the engineer, supervisor, managers, all of you are in problems. I think as regulators, you need to do our job better,” said Wahome.

She added: “We need to remove quacks. We need to take you out of the practice for whatever years that the regulator (the board) allows us, depending on the gravity of the compromise we have made as professionals.”

The CS said she will personally not stand with anybody who agrees to go through shortcuts or takes shortcuts.

“If we are going to change this country of ours, we must start to practice through the laws, under the laws, using the regulations properly and agreeing not to be part of the bad practices that then take us to a corrupt building and loss of lives. Indeed, we need to have these people in court. We need to jail some of them," she said.

CS Wahome asked the Board to review the pass marks that graduate architects and quantity surveyors use to pass to qualify.

“I think our training, of course, you are one of those people who stay in school forever. Six years, two or three then after that, there is an exam. An exam which we sometimes do three, or four times before you pass. I want to encourage the board to avoid the practice of failing students,” she said.

She added: “Students who are graduates of a six-year course should never fail a board exam unless they are the world president. Also, don't make the pass marks very high. These people need to get out there and go and grab it together.”

Arch Sylvester Muli urged fellow architects and quantity surveyors to be aware of emerging technologies like Artificial Intelligence (AI) lest they become obsolete.

“As one of the presenters has said, AI has been with us and late as the 1950s and is only now that it’s taking prominence and its upon us to be aware and be prepared for it less we become obsolete shortly since it is going affect the practice of professionals and even teaching in high learning institutions,” said Muli.

He said the Board will enhance AI to continue bringing to speed their members on what is happening.

The chairman also asked the professionals to study the new scale of fee documents and start applying them.

“I also ask you to study the Code of Conduct given to you and apply it even as you apply the fees. Do you conduct yourself?” he said.