Engr. Kashima Ali is the President, Council for the Regulation of Engineering in Nigeria. In this interview with Francis Kadiri, the COREN-registered engineer discusses the gains of the Council’s efforts at internationalising Nigeria’s engineering certifications. Excerpts.
What is COREN, under your watch, doing to add value to its certification beyond the shores of Nigeria?
One of the motivations that prompted me to seek to be President of the Council for the Regulation of Engineering in Nigeria is the need to push the frontiers of engineering development beyond where it was. In the 70s and some part of the 80s, Nigerian certification and educational awards were highly regarded in other parts of the world, but we are now being discriminated against by the same international community, which held us in high esteem. Worse still, even locally, we seem to be losing confidence in our own system because some Nigerians will tell you that nothing is working in Nigeria.
I am very happy that God used me and my team to score the goal of restoring the quality of engineering education in Nigeria and also earning the respect of the international community for our certifications in engineering
So I felt we should change the narrative by taking a look at ourselves. The first thing we did as a council was to bring to a roundtable, all Deans of the Faculties of Engineering and Heads of Departments of Engineering in universities. Together, we examined the curricula for engineering programmes in order to ascertain whether or not they are on a par with those in developed countries and other parts of the world. We found that some universities were operating like an Island because they were operating away from what is obtainable.
So we harmonised our programmes to create a benchmark above which any university can aspire.
The document stipulates the benchmark that guides COREN in deciding whether or not to grant accreditation to universities seeking accreditation of engineering school. We began to prepare the document in 2013 and we finished it in 2014.
Was this only a Nigerian affair?
Although it was the work of intellectuals, we subjected it to local and international scrutiny. Even UNESCO scrutinised it. COREN was invited to be on the board of International Science Technology and Innovation Centre for South-South Cooperation (UNESCO-ISTIC), an organ of UNESCO, and I am still on the board.
I used the platform to reach out to UNESCO and we sent the benchmark-document to the UNESCO hub, which is in Indonesia. The document was subjected to scrutiny by UNESCO’s expert groups, which ratified it. They said if that was the benchmark in force in Nigeria, then engineers who are trained in Nigerian universities are not inferior. However, to give credence to it, they needed to be sure, so we had to organise a high-level policy forum of educational institutions in Nigeria in order to avail UNESCO the opportunity to interact with us and get convinced that our educational policy as regards engineering is among the best.
ISTICSS is headquartered in Malaysia and as a result of the relationship we built; the Malaysian government indicated interest and sponsored that programme, which enabled us to invite other countries in Africa. In fact, UNESCO mandated COREN to be the focal point in Africa and that was an enviable show of regard. We invited other African countries to Abuja for the policy forum where we also discussed what we have and what they have in their respective countries. In the end, we gave them the template we devised.
After achieving this, COREN embarked on visitation to Nigerian universities. In one of the universities, we realised that the teaching of engineering was still input based, i.e., the lecturer prepares his lecture notes and comes to the class, teaches students and guides them according to what he or she knows. This means the students are limited to the knowledge of their teacher, which they regurgitate to pass their examinations and become graduates of engineering.
So COREN said no, education has become output-based, not input-based. The starting point is that nobody should be an accidental engineer. You must come into engineering because you want to pursue a career in engineering. You must also be able to have a vision of what exactly you want to get from engineering and how you hope to deploy your engineering discipline to affect the society by solving problems. So we need people who are passionate about engineering.
We changed the template to outcome based engineering education and we convened a train-the-trainers workshop, which attracted resource fellows from all over the world. Then COREN convened a second high-level policy forum to confirm that every requirement had been put in place.
Who are your international collaborators and how did you reach out to the international community?
The news of what we did spread very fast and I was invited to address Southern American engineering institutions in order to share the strategies COREN deployed that commanded the regard of the international community for Nigeria’s engineering education. I must confess that initially, the invitation did not make much meaning to me until I got there. They had a very bad impression of the system in Nigeria; they believed that Nigeria was the rebel of the world. They didn’t know how to help us. I gave my speech, and while doing so, I made a categorical statement: “Africa is not in need of spoon-feeding, what Africa needs is respect of some sort for what we are doing well, and correction for what we are not doing well.”
I made them understand that we should be friends and that they could come to Nigeria as our friends, not masters. My emotional statement inspired an ovation in the hall, which was spearheaded by Africans, and I became a celebrity. After the meeting, people of various nations came to snap with me. An official of the Washington Accord approached me and requested I joined the movement. The Washington Accord is a major sub set of the international engineering alliance that has controls in engineering all over the world. Dublin Accord and Sydney Accord are for technicians. If your country is not a member of the Washington Accord, it means it has not enjoyed some sort of engineering regard. So I am very happy that COREN has been able to raise the bar domestically while also being able to command commensurate respect of the world.
Why would some countries not be regarded, internationally?
Sometimes, international agencies ignore some nations because they have not earned relevant qualifications required for international regard. They would insist that a nation must belong to an international community of experts before it can join in making major decisions for the profession. As engineers, we knew this condition many years ago but Nigeria did not attain it until the present COREN Council came on board. So my joy is that I am certainly going to be remembered as the engineer who presided over the Council, which activities internationalised Nigeria’s certification in engineering.
So, I accepted to honour the invitation to the Washington Accord for their workshop. It was the first time COREN was being invited. COREN made a presentation to the Board at Washington Accord and we let them know that our system of engineering education was one of the best in the world.
There were questions and people asked if what I said was really what was happening in Nigeria, and I said yes.
So, they continued to evaluate us and I am very happy that God used me and my team to score the goal of restoring the quality of engineering education in Nigeria and also earning the respect of the international community for our certifications in engineering. This means that engineers who are trained in Nigeria will be welcomed and regarded in other countries without being subjected to humiliation that comes with discrimination.
What is the status of Nigeria now?
Already, two countries have accepted to nominate Nigeria and I am optimistic that the incoming Council will sustain the pace we have set, and eventually make Nigeria a signatory to the Washington Accord in June this year – 2019.
If we are able to become a member of the Washington Accord, it means a certificate in Engineering from any Nigerian university will bear COREN certification, and give Nigeria-trained engineers the freedom to practise anywhere in the world.
In Asia and the Pacific, the nations amended their laws to pave the way for Nigeria to be brought into their August engineering bodies and that is a milestone.
This is a giant stride, but it also means more responsibility because we must sustain the quality of education that earned us the regard. The universities must be strict and continue to comply with the benchmark set by COREN.
