The Director Town Planning of Uyo Capital City development Authority (UCCDA) Elder Effiong Akpan has been elected national treasurer of Nigerian institute of town planning (NITP).
The election which was conducted during the 50th anniversary/ annual general meeting of NITP at Nicon Luxury Hotel, Abuja was closely contested. Elder Akpan defeated his opponent by a margin of 116 votes to emerge victorious.
Speaking with newsmen during an interview session in his office in uyo, Elder Akpan who said his opponent – the former National Secretary of the institute is a giant who many ran away from contesting against, attributed his victory to God’s grace, hard work, and his past record in the institute.
Elder Akpan who is the former National P.R.O NITP said his emergence as the National Treasurer and member of the management of the institute will afford him the opportunity to introduce e-banking in the institute. This he said will rid the institute of the financial malpractice and several court cases that have befallen the institute as a result of cash transaction. He promised to cultivate the habit of proper record keeping of financial transactions of the institute.
Elder Akpan also said his emergence will also be beneficial to members of the institute who are of Akwa Ibom extraction in that his new office will furnish him with useful information to share about registration and other activities of the institute. In his words the National Treasurer said “when members are to be appointed into committees, as a member of the management of the institute, I will have the power to bring in people from Akwa Ibom State into committees. I will also influence certain issues that will affect the state chapter positively”.
Elder Akpan used the opportunity to call on Akwa Ibom State to demosticate the urban and regional planning law in Akwa Ibom state. According to him, the law which was passed in 1992 is yet to be demosticated and as such is not implemented in Akwa Ibom State.
According to him the law which stipulate guide lines that must be regiously adhere to by developers is often violated even by politicians. In his words “politicians do not respect the procedure of submitting building plans and getting it approved before setting up a buildings. where there is no appropriate law in place, we have little or nothing to do in that regard as servants”.
Elder Akpan also said that Akwa Ibom State people tend to build houses very close to the road. He said the twelve metres, twenty five metres, forty five metres and sixty metres as the case may be are not religiously followed in Akwa Ibom State. As a result of this, he said an accident that happens on the road is likely to affect houses build so close to the road. He cited a recent case where a tanker had an accident and the entire houses that were along the road got burnt.
The Director town Planning also observed cases where people build too close to utility lives such as NEPA lines, drainage channels and cases where people build on flood plains blocking drainage channels. These the Director said causes physical problem and argued uyo residents to refrain from.
Meanwhile, Elder Akpan said that a draft bill for the demonstration of the urban and regional planning have been sent to Akwa Ibom State Exco for consideration. He said that after a proper consideration of the bill it will be sent to the State Ministry of Justice for finetuning and then to the house of assembly for consideration and passage of the bill into law.
Elder Akpan also said that intending developer should not be afraid to seek proper approval from the UCCDA provided they have a plan, building proposal, land agreement , tax clearance, affidavit of land ownership, letter of consent, site plan analysis report for residential building , environmental impact assessment report for commercial building. He said that once these documents are intact, the developer is certain to receive approval in less than three months
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