137 illegal blocks of hostels, motels and other structures at Iddo Sarki, located close to the University of Abuja main campus, has been demolished over the weekend, by the Federal Capital Territory Administration (FCTA).
The operation was led by a combined team of the Department of Development Control, the FCT Ministerial Committee on City Sanitation, the Department of Security Services, and agencies, in accordance with a Ministerial directive to remove all contraventions and illegality from the nation’s capital.
Chairman of the Ministerial Committee on City Sanitation, Comrade Ikharo Attah, disclosed that the FCT Minister was enraged by people’s repeated disregard for warnings to stay away from local Chiefs who have no authority to sell lands or transfer any valid title to buyers of such land, according to the provisions of the Land Use Act.
That exercise, according to Attah, was a fast intervention to avoid further distorting the city’s growth plans and to save desperate businessmen and women from financial ruin.
He said it was unfortunate that some people continued to ignore timely warnings and enter into land transactions with local chiefs without the approval of the relevant government.
He further stated that, if the illegal hostel blocks and other development projects on the site had followed official procedures, the millions of Naira invested would have been properly directed, had they complied with official procedures.
While adding that, the shortcut process undertaken by the investors had not only infringed heavily on extant laws but distorted the Abuja Master plan, while leading to colossal economic waste.
His words, “FCT Minister has an avowed commitment to espousing investment in the city, but would not tolerate illegalities and disobedience to the provisions of the Land Use Act.
“FCTA is pained about what is going on here. FCT Minister had briefed the Directors of Development Control, security services and DRTS, and had given us a matching order to stop what he termed as extreme illegality here.
“These people were taken advantage of the closeness of the University of Abuja to sell every available land here. You can imagine that someone here had built a house that runs into hundreds of millions of Naira, without proper approval, but just based on an ordinary agreement signed with the Chief on foolscap sheet, that for me is an aberration.
“No one here has any allocation. It is very sad and worrisome that Abuja is going this way. What the natives are telling people here is that if you buy land and build, before Development Control will come you would have recovered your money.
“The Minister has ordered that this place be cleared as a signal to people. Those who want to build hostels for students can approach the administration and the University management and do it on building operate and transfer (BOT) or build, operate and own (BOO) arrangements with proper allocation and development approval from the government.
“The Chiefs have denied that they never sold any land, while the buyers who insist they bought the land from the chiefs are now lamenting. We asked them to produce papers of approval, but none of them has done that. They said they bought the land between N2 million and N7 million.”
He further added that while the developers have no valid title to the land, the buildings erected on it had no approval.
He said; “All this area has long been allocated, part of this land has been allocated to the Nigerian Navy, they have complained about encroachment.”
“We have come here several times and sensitised them to stop this illegal development, FCT Administration is not very happy with what is going on here.”
“We have marked the illegal buildings several times, and they were cleaned off. We have met with the Chiefs and youth leaders on the need to get a permit before any expansion, but they have not done that.”
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