President Bola Tinubu on Tuesday called for stronger engineering regulation, effective enforcement and proportionate sanctions to safeguard lives and improve the quality of infrastructure across Nigeria.
Tinubu made the call while declaring open the 34th Engineering Assembly of the Council for the Regulation of Engineering in Nigeria (COREN) in Abuja.
Speaking on the theme: “Advancing Public Safety in Nigeria through Strategic Engineering Regulation, Enforcement and a Tiered Sanction Regime,” Tinubu said engineering regulation must shift from being largely reactive to a preventive, data-driven and enforceable system that prioritisespublic safety.
Tinubu, who was represented by the Minister of Works, David Umahi, said that while doing their jobs, engineers must ensure safety.
“Engineering is not only about roads, bridges, buildings, dams, power systems and digital infrastructure. It includes the safety of the child walking to school, the trader travelling to the market, the patient being rushed to hospital and every Nigerian who depends on public infrastructure.”
He stressed that engineering failures result in loss of lives, wasted investments and diminished public confidence, insisting that public safety must remain the first principle of engineering practice.
The president described COREN as a public safety institution charged with regulating engineering practice and protecting Nigerians from substandard infrastructure.
He said: “Regulation should not be seen as punishment. Regulation is protection. It protects the public from incompetence, clients from poor delivery, government from waste, investors from failed infrastructure and, most importantly, it protects lives.”
Tinubu added that engineering regulation must cover every phase of infrastructure delivery, from planning and design to construction, supervision, maintenance and eventual decommissioning, reaffirming his administration’s commitment to delivering durable infrastructure across the country.
“Every road project that we are doing has a life span of between 50 and 100 years. This is a complete departure from previous practice where most roads never lasted up to five years,” he said.
The president stressed that Nigeria requires “a balanced system of strong regulation, fair enforcement and proportionate sanctions” to ensure engineering excellence and public safety.
In his welcome address, COREN President, Prof. Zubair Abubakar, said the Assembly’s theme reflected the council’s statutory responsibility to protect the public through effective engineering regulation.
He noted that engineering failures often have devastating consequences, making robust compliance monitoring, enforcement and accountability essential to professional practice.
Abubakar highlighted several achievements recorded by COREN, including the introduction of admission quotas for engineering programmes in collaboration with the National Universities Commission (NUC) and the Joint Admissions and Matriculation Board (JAMB) to improve the quality of engineering education.
He also disclosed that the council had intensified nationwide compliance inspections on infrastructure projects and industrial facilities, strengthened enforcement activities against unsafe engineering practices, expanded digital registration and verification services, and enhanced professional development programmes for engineering practitioners.
According to him, COREN has also made progress in developing engineering codes and standards, strengthening international partnerships and introducing engineering intelligence and risk-based regulation to detect and prevent potential failures before they occur.
Despite the progress, Abubakar identified persistent quackery, inadequate compliance with engineering standards, weak enforcement mechanisms, infrastructure deterioration and rapid technological changes as major challenges confronting engineering regulation in Nigeria.
“We must move from reactive regulation to predictive and preventive engineering governance,” he said, urging stakeholders to embrace strategic regulation, risk-based inspections, ethical practice, technology-driven systems and stronger collaboration.
Also speaking, President and Chief Executive of the Dangote Group, Aliko Dangote, represented by the Group’s Chief Economist, Prof. Hassan Mahmoud, described engineering as a public trust whose success determines public safety, industrial growth and investor confidence.
Dangote said engineering excellence had become a strategic economic imperative for Nigeria, particularly as the country seeks to bridge its infrastructure deficit and position itself as an industrial hub under the African Continental Free Trade Area.
He maintained that effective engineering regulation should anticipate risks rather than merely respond to failures.
“Good regulation is an investment enabler. Countries that attract long-term capital are those where investors trust engineering standards because quality engineering reduces risk and life-cycle costs,” he said.
Drawing from the Dangote Refinery project, he said safety and engineering discipline were embedded in every engineering decision, noting that the cost of maintaining high standards was far less than the consequences of engineering failures.
Dangote also advocated transparent and proportionate sanctions that distinguish between administrative errors, professional negligence and deliberate misconduct while maintaining zero tolerance for repeated violations that endanger lives.
He urged regulators to address institutional challenges such as poor procurement systems, political interference and disregard for professional advice, stressing that effective regulation should tackle the root causes of engineering failures rather than merely punish offenders.
Emmanuel Addeh