“While it may be easier to be polite, it is more important to face facts so that you can make progress.” – Bill Gates at the National Economic Council meeting at Abuja, 2018.

A high-confidence junior colleague shared with this writer a letter written to the National Executive Council of the Nigerian Institute of Town Planners (NITP) by a young planner, which was posted on WhatsApp on October 29th, 2025. For personal reasons, the writer’s identity is being kept anonymous.

The letter was titled: “A cry for order: A Young Planner’s Displeasure with the Ongoing 2025 NITP Conference.”  The junior colleague who sent the letter to me reacted with a terse statement: “This is a serious call to order if you ask me.” And my reaction to his statement went thus:

“I have read the letter. It is a serious indictment against the NITP as a “professional body” by a young planner. I wrote to thank the author of the letter for his courage in putting his observations and manifest foibles of the NITP in writing [for the record]. All the shortcomings he identified are genuine and thought-provoking. I pray that the NEC of the NITP deliberates on the issues raised by the young planner. Truly, there is no success without a successor.

“The NITP needs to shape up. It is not as visible and vocal as the Nigerian Bar Association (NBA) or the Nigerian Society of Engineers (NSE) in the scheme of things in Nigeria, despite the fact of its (NITP’s) enormous importance to national development.”

I took a step further to share the same letter with a couple of other town planner colleagues and received one dispassionate comment, which is worthy and appropriate to share: “Happy New Month to you, sir. I hope you are doing great. Best regards to your family. Thank you for sharing the open letter to the NITP. The observations of this young planner are valid and have been there over the years. Nothing has changed. The NITP and the practice of the profession in Nigeria remain (worrisome). Very unfortunate.”

A former NITP President succinctly wrote: “Putting NITP back on track is for all members.”

As I was about to conclude this piece, another former president of the Institute, who is a reputable town planning practitioner in the private sector, sent me a message. He shared his experience with nostalgia as follows: “Good evening, sir. I read the letter since Thursday morning. It was sent to me by a Past National Secretary. The students are right. They knew how they were treated when I was privileged to be the National President. What they              experienced this year [2025] was far below expectations. I’m sure the Executive must be realizing their folly in going against the NITP Constitution and Conventions.”

Readers may want to ask what the young planner’s lamentation was about the Institute, his grievances against the professional body, and its repeated shortcomings. For brevity, permit me to paraphrase what was running through the mind of the Young Turk Town Planner (YTTP):

1.    Lamentation: He felt a deep sense of displeasure and disappointment about the NITP’s poor and inefficient system of registration and organization at the just-concluded 2025 National Conference. It is ironic that manual registration still prevails under a lead organization and a proponent “for smart cities and digital futures.” What a paradox!

2.    Grievances: The holding capacity of the conference hall was grossly inadequate for the expected number of the confab’s attendees, while other complementary facilities at the venue were poorly maintained. (ii) There was no commensurate value for the exorbitant registration fees paid by the gamut of conference participants. The quality of services provided by the conference organizers was abysmal.

3.    Observation: The inattentive/non-inclusion of young planners in the participation of panel sessions and key discussions. He quipped: How can the NITP that often promotes ‘future sustainability’ and inclusive planning ignore the very group that represents the future of the profession? Another paradox!

The NITP is not a perfect organisation. I can vouch for the excellent quality of leadership provided by a selected few among past presidents of the Institute and the impact they made during their tenure. However, what is worrisome about the Institute is the persistent way its shortcomings or failings are exhibited at every annual conference to the point of incorrigibility.

There are no kind words or compliments from some concerned senior members of the NITP on the way and manner the annual national conferences were usually conducted. This letter of complaint, written by a young planner, corroborated such similar feelings. The NITP could do better.

Frankly, the National Planning Committee is usually responsible for the shambolic arrangements at each of the NITP annual conferences.

The precedent to any action is preparation. Mission and vision are easily accomplished only when you prepare for them. The Conference Planning Committee members seldom pay attention to the minute details that are meant to facilitate a seamless conference. They underrate the enormous responsibility thrust on them. More often, they fail to plan properly and plan to fail, as in the instant situation under reference.

Although it is hard to accept the fact, their proclivity to cut corners for pecuniary gains seems normal, but not an action that should be roundly condemned. To dip their hands into the cookie jar(finances) of the Institute is never considered an anathema, but a normal practice(?). All these anomalies persist because there is a weak accountability system to detect fraudulent conduct, and when one is detected, there is no punishment meted out to the rogue offender(s) as deterrence. Unless the members of the Conference Planning Committee are under close watch and constant scrutiny during the conference period, corrupt practices will be difficult to discover and curtail.

Therefore, we also suggest that whoever is the incumbent president should be actively involved in the preparation of the National Conference as the overall monitor or overseer. To leave such an important task unsupervised at the executive level is a serious gaffe.  The president must not show a passing interest or be lethargic. If the conference is well-organized, the president claims the glory. If it falls below expectations, he/she will be blamed for the poor organization and solely bear the brunt of the ignominy associated with such a failure.

The NITP should create room for mentoring young planners. It is no gainsaying that the Institute has a group of cerebral and competent planners who should serve as mentors to the budding planners. Experience, as they say, is the best teacher. The crop of brilliant urban planning professors or practitioners in private practice will do a great service to the sustainability of the profession if they constantly share their wealth of experience with the generation of young planners, who also have the advantage of IT and AI skills that the senior planners could learn from.

There is a palpable fear that the number of new student entrants into the Town Planning profession is not encouraging, and if care is not taken, the situation will continue to go south. That is all the more reason the NITP should devise all means to reverse the trend. The profession should be incentivized to attract new intakes.

 Finally, we should be reminded that failure of good performance by the Institute is not necessarily the result of what the NITP did wrong, but the cumulative effects of things the Institute never did properly to excel.

By Tpl. Yacoob Abiodun, Planning Advocate, Parkview Estate, Lagos, 08103501024