The Quantity Surveyors Registration Board of Nigeria, QSRBN, has threatened to prosecute foreigners practising the quantity surveying in Nigeria. QSRBN President, Mallam Husaini Adamu Dikko who stated this in Abuja, said the Board is already compiling the list of these expatriates and will soon commence their prosecution in the courts according.

Mallam Dikko said "we are not unaware of the presence of some persons especially non-Nigerians who are practising as quantity surveyors in Nigeria in clear violation of the Quantity Surveyors Board of Nigeria, Act Cap 383 LFN 1990.

Noting that the country has a total of 2,000 registered quantity surveyors and 150 practising firms, the Dikko said the QSRBN governing board is in the process of reforming the Board to position it adequately to discharge its mandate.

"The Board is critically examining situations where huge capital projects in the building and construction sector are regularly executed without the quantity surveyors input on the government side.

The ideal situation is that the quantity surveyors cost advice must be sought and obtained on any building and construction project in which government fund is involved whether at the Federal, State or local government level," he said.

The QSRBN boss explained that "this is because the government fund is tax payer's money and public accountability demands so. We should as a country be able to capture our capital formation at real cost and Gross Domestic Product as actual factor costs not inflated costs".

"The involvement of quantity surveyors will lead to huge savings which will be deployed to social services and infrastructure for welfare maximisation for the citizenry," he said.

Mallam Dikko regretted that, "construction projects have become instrument for money laundering by highly placed officials who play all kinds of tricks to evade the eagle eyes of the EFCC and ICPC. Registered quantity surveyors have a patriotic duty to monitor construction costs to checkmate and block money laundry.

"The current high cost of construction projects especially road and other engineering projects is possible because quantity surveyors are often not allowed to perform their cost functions on such projects," he alleged.