UGANDA, Mbarara | Real Muloodi News | Leaders from the western area raise concerns about the country’s shortage of architects, claiming it will impede the development of the housing industry.
While every local government entity should have an architect, there are currently only 270 registered architects in the nation, according to information provided to the leaders at the dissemination and stakeholders workshop that the Architects Registration Board (ARB) hosted in Mbarara on Friday, November 18.
According to the most recent Ministry of Local Government data, the nation has one capital city, 135 districts, 10 cities, 31 municipalities, and 580 town councils, as well as all of these, require building committees with an architect per Section 28 of the Building Control Act 2013.
Based on the data above, there is currently a shortage of 487 architects in the nation.
The shortage of architects in the county, according to Mr Richard Mugisha, the deputy city clerk for Mbarara, is continuing to generate problems for the housing industry.
Col. James Mwesigye, a Residential City Commissioner in Mbarara, claimed that the absence of architects in the nation may be to blame for the prevalence of charlatans and the existence of subpar and crumbling structures, particularly in urban areas.
“I now come to sympathise with developers who use quacks to draw their plans which are partly responsible for collapsing and substandard buildings. We have been in Mbarara and the whole region with no registered architect. The government needs to do something if we are to have an organised housing sector in the region,” he said.
He added that because local governments do not have a mechanism in place for their recruitment, even the 270 registered architects are not allowed to work for government organisations.
Mr Elly Muhwezi, a Senior Secretary at Bushenyi District said: “Our hands are tied. The law requires us to have architects but there is no funding to recruit these and even we have wage issues. The ARB should be the one to influence government and public service to recruit these architects.”
Because architecture is a relatively new discipline at educational institutions, Mr Robert Kiggundu, the board chairperson of ARB, claimed that there are not many architects in the nation.
“The Architecture course started in 1989 but even then the completion rate is very low because it’s a difficult course. That is partly the reason why there are a few professionals,” he said.
He said that according to ARB data from 2018, the majority of districts lack architects.
“In 2018 majority of districts and local government entities did not have architects, only one had a registered architect and that was Kampala City Council Authority (KCCA) but the law requires every district and local government entity to have an architect,” Mr Kigundu noted.
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