On 23rd and 24th March 2022, the land of a Thousand Hills through the Quantity Surveyors’ Chapter under the Rwanda Institute of Architects hosted an Executive Committee Meeting for Africa Association of Quantity Surveyors (AAQS) and a Continuous Professional Development (CPD) Seminar for over 80 local Professional Quantity Surveyors practitioners. AAQS hybrid Ex-co Meeting was attended by its senior leadership and highly experienced Professional Quantity Surveyors from various African countries to mention a few included Nigeria, Kenya, Zambia, Ghana, Uganda, South Africa, Rwanda etc. To those that were privileged to attend the meeting, left with handful stories to share with the rest of the world. Warm conversations full of artistic and professional stories kept the Audience alive and engaged. Kigali at Night confirms the importance of professionals in construction sector and the level of development the nation has attained from the ashes of the 1994 Genocide against the Tutsi. How about the night out at Pili-Pili restaurant where dawn found us steady?
Based on the core objectives of the AAQS which is to promote the recognition of the Quantity Surveyors’ roles in the development of national economies of African nations as well as to maintain a high public confidence in the integrity and competence of qualified Quantity Surveyors practicing in Africa. This time, Rwanda enjoyed the benefits of her membership with AAQS through the Quantity Surveyors chapter under Rwanda Institute of Architects (RIA/QS Chapter).
The leadership of AAQS together with the leadership of RIA/QS Chapter met the Rwanda’s Minister of infrastructure (MININFRA) and Minister of Finance and Economic Planning (MINECOFIN) with an intent of sharing best professional practices that Quantity Surveyors offer and benchmarking on the untapped potentials of profession since it would immensely contribute to the growth and development of the Rwanda as a nation.
The continuous Professional Development seminar was organized under the theme “the need of integrating Quantity surveying Profession in both private and public institutions”. With
top notch speakers, sharing best practices of the profession both at regional and international level and modalities of collaboration with other professional in the construction industry such as Architecture, Engineering, Land Surveying and Urban Planners.
The meeting also enabled local QS practitioners to appreciate the need of working together to take the national QS chapter to another level. This was reiterated by Mr. Charles Lugira, The Chairperson of Governing Council of the Quantity Surveyors Chapter under Rwanda Institute of Architects, who used the platform to remind QS professionals the need to come together for the common good of recognition of their profession and work by several stakeholders. “The Government of Rwanda invested a lot of money in bringing the Quantity Surveying profession and this should be the right time for the Government to get return on investment made in this new profession” he added.
The RIA/QS Chapter further asserted that the current law governing the profession of architecture and Engineering should be amended to accommodate the Quantity Surveying practice as an independent profession rather than a service offered by architects. He further requested for AAQS routine support especially the required Capacity Development of local young Quantity Surveyors. He expressed the need of training of local Quantity Surveyors under practice and strong partnership with AAQS to ensure that the QS academic training is also done to help in smooth professional practice and skill migration across Africa and the World.
In the recognition of this need, the AAQS President QS Onashile Obafemi guaranteed five (5) scholarships young Rwandan QSs through his firm known as CONSOL ASSOCIATES LTD.
He also added that interested national Quantity Surveyors are encouraged to join AAQS Graduates school whereby they will acquire skills related to the professional practice. He further asserted that further training opportunities will be guaranteed through AAQS Stakeholders/partners.
The AAQS president, on behalf of the AAQS Executive Committee and AAQS members thanked the RIA/QS chapter for hosting the event with a positive effect to the professional practice.
Furthermore, Frederic Nyaminani, the Vice-Chairperson of RIA/Quantity Surveyors’ Chapter, stressed the history of the profession saying that although in countries like Rwanda it may appear to be new but it can be traced as early as the 18th Century in United Kingdom and in the EAC region in 1940s. “Although today the profession is referred several names like Cost Estimators, Cost Planners, Cost Managers, Cost Engineers, Cost Consultants and contract depending on the country but it doesn’t change the core job” he noted.
Nyaminani called on all stakeholders to come together to do more awareness so that public understands more the profession to avoid confusion based on the definition. This conference has given clear direction on the way forward for the chapter and we are lucky to have you on board for will not invent the will while improving on our chapter profession practices and work ethics.
In addition, QS Bonaventure Dushimimana, as one of the pioneers of local Quantity Surveyors and the Head of Practice of the RIA/QS Council, reported that the QS practice has never been easy due to lack of legal recognition and public awareness. He highly appreciated AAQS advocacy to the Ministry of infrastructure as well as other Government entities to recognize the profession.
