Lagos trains facility managers on modern maintenance of state-owned estates
Workshop
The Lagos State Ministry of Housing on Monday trained facility managers on modern maintenance practices and operational innovation on state-owned estates.
The Facility Management Workshop held in Lagos, has the theme: “Knowing Your Estate to Own It.”
The Permanent Secretary of the ministry, Mr Gbolahan Toriola, said that the training aligned with the establishment of a dedicated Facility Management Unit and the introduction of standardised operational guidelines for all state-owned residential estates.
Toriola said that the workshop would solve the primary problems facing state-owned housing estates.
He said that such problems included the proliferation of illegal structures, unauthorised building extensions, severe infrastructure neglect, and environmental challenges like flooding.
The permanent secretary said that the workshop was aimed at equipping facility managers with sustainable maintenance strategies, best practices, and operational guidelines for state-owned housing schemes.
Toriola urged participants to be proactive and innovative in maintaining public infrastructure, ensuring long-term aesthetic and economic value of those state-owned estates.
“This seminar was organised by the ministry. It is to ensure sustainability of our estates by educating our facility managers and estate executives on how to sustain their estate in a modernised way.
“We want them to be proactive and not a reactive executive and facility managers. This is why we said “knowing your estate”, as the theme.
“So the facility manager’s duty is to maintain these estates on behalf of the government. This is because we have had estate being develop by the Lagos government but the structure is not well planned.
“When you look at some old estates that were constructed in the 1970s and 1980s, if you go to those estates today you will see that they cannot sustain them.
“This means facility managers are put there to give government up-to-date knowledge about those estates, to carry out some maintenance with respect to the service charge collected from allotees or residents of the estates,” he said.
Toriola said that it was important to educate them to know their responsibility and know the duty the government had engage them for.
He said that the facility managers should improve on knowledge-based, improve on their staff welfare and train their staff because a trained staff remained an asset than liability to the organisation.
Some prominent state-owned housing estates in Lagos included Dolphin Estate located in Ikoyi; Jakande Estate with multiple phases across various local government areas like Isolo and Ejigbo, and Abraham Adesanya Housing Estate located in Ajah.
Other are Iponri Housing Estate located in Surulere; Oluwole Estate located in Ogba, and Sunshine Estate located in Oko-Oba, Agege.
Also, Alapere Medium Estate located in Alapere, Ketu; Abesan Estate located in Ipaja, Alimosho, and Iba Housing Estate located in Iba.
Also speaking, Mrs Temitope Akinbola, the Coordinating Director, Lagos State Real Estate Regulatory Authority (LASRERA), urged the facility managers to register with the authority to avoid clampdown on them.
Akinbola said that any facility manager that was operating within the state without the authority permit was operating illegally.
The Managing Director, Green Facilities Limited, Dr Olumide Aina, said that stakeholders, including landlords and tenants, must adhere to established rules for communal areas.
Aina, a facilitator at the workshop, said that a clear communication of rules and culture was also vital for new residents to prevent misunderstandings.
He, however, urged facility managers to develop a Standard Operating Procedures (SOPs) to guide operations and maintenance.
Mr Bukola Oloyede, a participant, who is one of the facility managers from the ministry, said that the workshop had educated them and estate associations in the state.
Oloyede said that the workshop emphasised the importance of proper estate management and maintenance in the state.
“Based on the series of presentation we have had, I am happy that this programme is coming up, even in a time like this for us to learn, unlearn and to relearn.
“Most of our estates are getting dilapidated, and this workshop with the stakeholders is to ensure that we put things in the right order in the estates,” he said. (NAN)
