YOUR NEIGHBORHOOD AND YOU: A program sponsored by Sustainable design consult dedicated to enlighten listeners to know about the environment, the rights of citizens living in an environment, environmental hazards and things needed to be done to prevent hazards from happening.
On a new episode, the host, Comfort Omolafe will be asking some questions from the sponsor of the program, Tpl. Ogunseyi Ayodele about people knowing their rights within town planning law, How people know their rights within the town planning laws of Nigeria.
Explain in a layman’s language what town planning is, Who a town planner is, and is the town planning law for citizens or the government?
Tpl Ogunseyi Ayodele said town planning is how to design our cities and town in order to make them attractive and convenient for the people who lives. Basically, it focuses on the management and use of our law. Town planner is someone who went to school to study urban and regional planning to graduate, he is someone who sat for TOPREC {Town planner registration council of Nigeria} examination and if he/she passes the examination and fulfill all righteousness, he/she will then be licensed to practice and be called registered town planner. He said if one graduated from school and didn’t write TOPREC exam, he/she cannot be recognized as a registered town planner.
Town planning law is for the citizens and the government, The law states that the government needs to apply for development permit. Individual needs to apply for development permit likewise the government agency. Planning law is for everyone.
If there is a problem within the community, let’s say site in the wrong ground used in the community. How can a community address this issue?
Tpl. Ogunseyi Ayodele answered by saying when there is a problem in the community related to environment {land use crisis}, He advice the community to consult a registered town planner. When there is issue with someone in your area or business areas, first thing that comes to mind is consulting a lawyer, so same thing is applicable to land use crisis, all you need do is consult a well registered town planner, he/she will advise you on what to do, The person will write on your behalf. He said there are some problems that need political solution, There are some problem that needs the community and the regulator to sit down together and find solution to so all these avenue can be taken and the person that can help you to get justice speedily. He said it’s very difficult sometimes for some people to know if some town planners are actually operating on their own, what we grew up to know is ministry of town planning but now in Ondo state, it is called ministry of physical planning and urban development, we always think that people that are working there are the only town planner. He said there are professional town planners in the town in their offices doing the profession diligently and if peradventure a community or an individual is having issues and they don’t know how to consult or how to get a town planner, all they need do is go to the website of the institute, from there they will get the names of the available consultant in Ondo state. The website for the institute is www.nitpondo.org and the details of the consultants in Ondo state will be there as well. Anybody can consult the town planners on the website if there is issue with the community and you don’t know how to go about it. He said every community ought to have a town planner that will be guiding them, guiding their development. When one look at the need of physical planning, they have limited staff and it may be difficult for them to be of help to solving your problem. They can’t be in Akure and at the same time be in Owo, they can’t be in Owo and at the same time be in a remote area. The community can have a town planner that will be helping them maybe during their meeting to discuss about how to channel the development of their community and it will make it easier for them because when they have a good plan on ground, the crisis in the future has been solved by half or even more than half.
He said he will advise all the communities, maybe all these community development association in our neighborhood that it’s better that they have a consultant, a town planner that will be helping them in the development of their land and this can solve most of their problems within instead of just going to the ministry. He said they can involve the government to help out to the ones that is critical or maybe difficult to solve.
How can problems of accessibility, building construction where drainage is supposed to pass through within houses closer to watercourse in some new towns or new site be tackled?
Tpl. Ogunseyi Ayodele said they have discussed about the layout plan and the benefit of having a layout in the program before. When you have an approved layout before selling your plot, accessibility problem must have been taken care of during the layout preparation. When you can translate what is on your layout on the ground, which means you are not expecting that area or that community to have problem or accessibility issue. If somebody like me, somebody like you wants to buy land, The first thing we should ask is if what you are buying is approved , then you can give one copy of the layout to your town planner to help you interpret it if you can’t interpret it. The town planner will make sure that he/she gets in contact with the local planning authority to know if that layout is well okay. The best thing is when we are getting our landed property, we should ask for the approved layout to avoid issues in the future.
What do you have to say about the problems of waste dumped along the road divide when we have town planners?
Tpl. Ogunseyi Ayodele said waste management is part of the environment, part of what town planners look out to solve is the problem of wastes dumped where is not proper. In Ondo state, wastes dumped on the road or anywhere within the city is not really the work of the town planner, there are agencies that in charge of it. He said waste management authorities is under ministry of environment. He said it’s the people that dump waste on the roadside and it is a criminal offense to dump waste where it is not proper. People see waste as a problem instead of seeing it as a business opportunity i.e investing on waste management, having a private dumpsite, managing every waste article that are coming there and you can turn the ones turn to fertilizer, the ones that needed to be recycled, the ones that you need to sell (iron articles that can be sold to scavengers, iron articles can be gathered and be sold later. Waste is not under town planning office, it is under waste management authority but it can be a collective work whereby everybody can manage their waste in different ways to keep the environment clean.
Aside from having the thought or plan of converting waste to wealth, don’t you think there should be stiffer measures? Is there a way town planners can make a law that goes against littering the environment?
Tpl. Ogunseyi Ayodele said it is a criminal offense for someone to dump waste on the road or somewhere not proper. He said people do not dump waste during day time, they dump their waste at night.
Are there no security personnel available to apprehend people dumping wastes in an improper place?
Tpl. Ogunseyi Ayodele said if the waste management authority can think of having some security personnel to monitor the people that are dumping waste in a location that is not being earmarked for waste dump, but the resources that waste management authority will use to channel that can be used for picking the waste in due time. In Akure most especially, the issue of government and PSP agent is more challenging because one can have a PSP agent today and by tomorrow they will be not be available and some people are looking at it that it’s not a lucrative business maybe because of the bottleneck that are involved. He said people should try and behave like good people and stop the habit of dumping wastes where it is not proper. But in a situation whereby the PSP are not there one week, 2 weeks, 3 weeks, it becomes crisis and this is why you see some people dumping on their own. He said the community, the association can just find a solution to why their PSP is not doing well, they can organize a truck and pack it maybe every for every two weeks and that will solve the problem instead of allowing some of their members to be dumping their wastes in a place that can create havoc for the community. All these things are minor things that community can take care of instead of depending on the government to do it.
Is it appropriate to continue a construction when there is a red mark on it?
Tpl. Ogunseyi Ayodele said markings on a building doesn’t mean that the building will be demolished. When the enforcement team of the Minister of physical planning are going out, when they get to the site and they ask for their development permit, if the constructors can’t produce it, the enforcement team will give them notice and they will red mark the house, the property or the construction on the site. it simply means that the constructor must visit the ministry of physical planning, bring every document to prove if the construction is approved and if it is, the constructor can then continue his/her work. Red marking doesn’t totally mean demolition, it means the ministry of physical planning has visited the place and needed to see the constructor/owner documents to clarify if what the ministry approved is not what the constructor/owner of the place is doing. There must be something that warrant red marking a construction and if what the regulators ask such person or the developer to do and the developer complies and maybe they all rectify whatever they ask him/her to do, the person will continue his/her construction.
Tpl. Ogunseyi Ayodele said he will like to tell the people, most especially all the community development association, they are the voice and when they stand for something, it always work out for them. He said when they are speaking with one voice and it is not illegal if what they are speaking on is right. The community must come together to plan on how they want to run their community and equally include a registered town planner to help them out.