Last month Melaku Feleke, a 40-year-old entrepreneur who is in the process of obtaining a building permit for a new house, was at Bole District administrative office in Megenagna, near AMCE.

With plans in hand, he came to the Permit Office of the District to submit his documents for review and approval.

Melaku is presenting a seven-year-old plan already rejected by the Office that needs to be updated. He was also planning to visit one of the government engineers or architects working at the Office to revise his design.

Different engineers and architects provide plan designs and revisions, but recently the city administration has drafted a new directive to involve new university graduates in engineering, architecture, sanitation and electricity in the construction industry.

Recently, the City Construction Bureau drafted a directive that stipulates three categories of opportunity creation - construction input, sub-contracting and consultancy, which includes the design and supervision of projects.

The directive was drafted with a plan of creating opportunities for the 20,000 graduates, according to Amare Mekonnen, communications director.

The Bureau then trained and certified 396 young graduates as consultants and organised them into 99 associations or enterprises. Each association consists of four professionals, and they were assigned to different district and wereda construction permitting offices across the capital.

The trainees were registered and recruited by the Small & Medium Enterprise (SME) after submitting certification of competence and professional licenses obtained from the Ministry of Urban Development & Construction and after receiving tax identification numbers.

The city’s scheme to engage new graduate engineers, architects and designers in the construction business is facing hurdles.

Bole district administration, where Melaku was processing his application, has assigned nine enterprises representing 36 newly certified professionals.

They also took a short orientation on forming new enterprises focusing on internal procedures, the construction directives, regulations and staff communication.

The scope of work and duties of the newly organised enterprises has two levels, depending on the extent of their experience.

Consultants assigned as Special Consultant One have a minimum of two years experience in construction work. They are permitted to handle design and supervision tasks for one-storey buildings with an aggregate project value of five million Birr or less.

Special Consultant Two are professionals who can handle consultancy projects on single-residence housing, minor construction and maintenance projects

The consulting rates and progress payments, which include a pre-payment of 20pc and retention payments of 30pc, are outlined in the directive.

But, the plan seems to bear hardly any fruit.

Three young architects and electrical engineers, all in their twenties and beneficiaries of the city’s opportunity creation efforts, claim to have received no project reference in the past month since they completed the registration and training programs.

“We're distributing fliers with our contact information to potential clients, but we haven’t had any business yet,” one of them said. “We are beginning to be frustrated.”

Although a month had passed since their assignment and a long line of service-seekers appear daily at the Office, the graduates have received no project references.

Based on the previous construction reports made at the district office, 10 weredaswere selected to have more construction work and the remaining four weredasto have fewer projects.

Even though the office of Bole district has posted a notice at the entrance with contact information about the graduates, Melaku is hesitant to use them.

He is worried because the government professionals in charge at the Office would be partial to any work prepared by the graduates and submitted for review.

“It is cutting into the self-interest of the government professionals of the bureau and the new assignees,” he said.

Most people are used to dealing with the professional staff in the office to prepare the designs, because they see advantages and have confidence in the outcome if everything is handled by the officials, according to him.

The Bureau has allowed the graduates to post a placard with their contact information at the entrance of the districts.

"And they have also distributed their fliers announcing their services," said Henok Regassa, construction permit & supervision head.

In addition to the opportunity creation scheme, the aim of initiating the program was to combat unethical practices at the district and weredaoffices, where clients were solicited for work by government professionals, according to Amare Mekonnen, director of communications at the Bureau.

“The Bureau has issued ethical directives to the construction staff prohibiting corrupt acts,” said Mekonnen.