₦airaland Forum

The Doctors' strike this time around is a strike too many. I am even more saddened by the responses of some of the doctors on this post. Like every other aspect of our national life , it shows a country in decay. Though i believe that the doctors like every other proffessional have a right to demand for better working conditions of services and that lagos state doctors (because of the volume of work they done ) need to be well compensated, i do not support the use of incessant strike as a toool for pressing home their demands by the doctors.
Medecine is a noble proffession and proffessionals in the fields should have employed other means of pressing home their demands aside from embarking on an indefinite strike. I am not a government supporter but the fact needs to be stated. you cannot compare any other state in nigeria to lagos state. How many doctors are there in such states as ekiti and osun state as compared to lagos. Want percentage of the state wages do the government in such state pay the health workers as compared to lagos state. You cannot expect a government to use all its resources to pay the health worker. Must other sectors be neglected because doctors are to be paid.
In nigeria , we know that the government are notoriously for not honouring agreements which may be quite painfully, but the use of strike as a tool for making demands especially in the health sector can be come out as mean because it is the ordinary man on the street that suffers. it should only be used when other options have been exhauxted.
I think the doctors should have used other means aside from strike. if other people are going on strike as frequently as the lagos doctors have , then what will be left of the state. if they are not crefully they will lose the support of the masses.

This Nigerian mentality of ' cheap is not good' is not necessarily correct. You can still build a high quality house within reasonable price limit. One thing people must understand is that a lot of things go into the cost of production that do not really have anything to do with the quality of the product. This means that two people can produce the same thing and the prices will be considerably different even though they are of similar quality.
one thing that must be understood in building is that location plays a significant role in determining the cost of a project.
From the point of view of design , a design can look good on paper and you will still encounter some problems in real life . in essence what i am trying to say is that , paper qualifications though very important, is not the only requirement for you to be a successfully engineer, because their are some onsite information you will never be taught in a school especially in a country like nigeria.
in construction projects, you can get knowledge from everywhere, both from artisans involved in the project( because of their long years on the field), from people involved in similar projects and even from people marketting building materials. it is now left to your as a proffessional to discern between the infomation that has been available to you. Paper qualifications alone does not make you a successfull engineer. You still need feild experience.
Coming to the issue of bungalows, if you are not going past the ground level and the soil is a very stable soil you do not need too much reinforcement, unless you are building on very unstable soils like in marsh or swamp lands or on expansive clay soils because of the expansion and contractions of the soil. it just that in nigeria we like to over build.Instead of spending money on putting up uneccessary reinforcement , the money could be better put in ensuring that the right concrete mix is used. this is where i feel problems usually comes from. So far house is not going above one floor, you are not building on very sloppy land or very unstable soils,you are using 9 inches blocks for at least the external walls and finally the bungalow is not too large and the ratio of the width to lenght is about 1:2 you can still get away with minimum number of pillars or even no pillars at all. afterall the mud houses in our villages are built with little or no reinforcement and some of them are still standing till today.

cost of roofing a moderate sized four bedroom bungalow with normal long span aluminum roofing sheets can range between 650 t0 800 thousand nail.( aluminium roofing sheets and wood work). I just did mine, mail nurelect@gmail.com for info.

please send me the details tolnursal@yahoo.com

agahowa, your recent post is totally out of order. No need for insults. please stick to constructive criticism.

I have been following this thread religiously for the past two months now and i must confess, it has really been insightful. i am however not happy with the current trend of things. Why is Am Alone being attacked. He is simply sharing his own experience which a lot of people are learning from. Its an alternative , if you have money , i believe you have right to spend it any how you want.  i may not have the kind of money he has to spend on building a house but i have certainly taken a lot of things from his posts, just as i have benefited from others that have written on this topic. its a choice thing.
A  beg Am Alone i love your roof  and although i am settling for long span aluminum due to cost, i have recommended this type of roof to others who can afford it.
Please lets not digress from the topic. A lot of people are learning from this thread. Peace

Please also need details on how to get a C of O in ogun . i will like to know the cost implication as well as the process involved.

I also need an estimate for a three bedroom bungalow on a solid ground with one room self contain at the back. home much will it cost to have a complete architectural drawing.