The Minister of Science and Technology, Dr. Ogbonnaya Onu and his Water Resources counterpart, Suleiman Adamu, have stressed the need to engage the services of indigenous scientists and engineers to correct the mistakes of the past.

They made the appeal at the 38th annual conference, dinner and general meeting of the Association for Consulting Engineering in Nigeria (ACEN) with the theme, “Formulating a national action plan towards integrating Nigerian consultants into national development – A case for inclusiveness.”

Onu said the deployment of indigenous talents was key to national development, adding that the usage of expatriates was not in the interest of the larger society.

On his part, Adamu, who is also ACEN president, said many countries globally had achieved great results through indigenous expertise.

He stressed that Nigerians understand what is best for them, hence the need to localise activities and by so doing, employment is being created.