Be innovate, Transport minister dares engineers
Minister of Transport and Public Works Jacob Hara has challenged local engineers to be creative to ensure that they are responsive to the country’s socio-economic development.
The minister said this on Thursday in Mangochi during the opening of 2022 Malawi Engineering Institution (MEI) annual lakeshore conferenc under the theme ‘Engineering: Key to Economic Acceleration.’
Hara, himself an engineer, said engineers should take the blame for the challenges the country is facing because they have not been innovative.
He said the country’s engineers have been sleeping on the job, resulting in their profession not bringing the needed impact to the society.
Hara said: “If you see that the country is this poor, if the country is in this bad economically, we should take the blame because we have been sleeping on our jobs as engineers.
“In Malawi 2063, some of our pillars that we have are industrialisation and engineers are the ones that can pioneer that.”
Hara, therefore, asked the engineers to work together whenever they have innovative ideas just like how their counterparts do in other countries.
He, however, warned that his ministry will not tolerate substandard work and asked the engineers to come up with local engineering standards that fit the climate and soil of the country.
Said Hara: “We want to build a platform through what was normally known as Plant and Vehicle Hire Organisation which is now be called Plant Vehicle Hire Engineering Services to give a room to indigenous engineers to build what they innovative ideas with governments support.
“We believe that with such, we will be able to harness the talent we have in indigenous engineers.”
In his remarks, MEI vice-president Paul Kulemeka said the meeting was organised to sensitise the engineering fraternity to the need to align themselves with the MW2063, the country’s long-term development plan.
He said this is the time the engineers should reflect on what has been done, what the challenges and risks are to align themselves properly for the country’s long-term golas.
Kulemeka agreed with the minister that it is high time the country stopped using foreign engineering standard for the growth and betterment of the country’s economy, saying the foreign standards may not be good in terms of Malawi’s economic growth.
He said: “You know we were a British colony so what we are using are British standards mostly and of course they may not necessarily be the best for our country in terms of economy.
They could be strong however I think now is the right time to change,” he explained.
