The first black civil engineer to graduate from the University of Natal in Durban, KwaZulu-Natal-born Trueman Goba, was recently inaugurated as the first black president of the South African Institution of Civil Engineering (SAICE).

Goba, who graduated from the University of Natal in 1979, is the executive chairman of the multidisciplinary firm of consulting engineers, Goba Moahloli Keeve Steyn. A registered professional engineer, he obtained his BSc (Eng) and MEng (Civil) degrees at the University of Natal in Durban and Cornell University in the USA, respectively. The SAICE presidential inauguration banquet was sponsored by design technology company, Autodesk, as part of its African innovation programme.

Reinforcing the Proudly South African theme of the banquet, Craig Yeatman, managing director, WorldsView Technologies, which distributes Autodesk software in Africa, said that Autodesk partners with numerous SA developers whose civil engineering design and geographic information systems (GIS) applications - developed specifically for local conditions - are powered by internationally developed Autodesk platforms.

He highlighted Autodesk's association with Technocad and Autograph, which develop civil design solutions, Prokon, which focuses on local structural solutions, and Open Spatial Solutions, which develops municipal management and geographic information systems (GIS) solutions.

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