The joint Committee of the Senate and House of Representatives on the Federal Capital Territory specifically directed the Development Control Department of the Federal Capital Development Authority (FCDA) to stay action on the proposed demolition of 37 estates until investigations into the legality of the allocations are ascertained.
The Chairman of the Joint Committee, Sen. Smart Adeyemi during deliberations on the demolitions with officials of the FCDA and representatives of the developers over the demolished 500 houses in Mananuel estate, located in the Gosa-Lugbe district, along the Airport road, directed the development control "to stop the demolition of 37 estates until we investigate the issue.”
"We will like to reach out to the developers and investigate how they came about the title documents to establish whether they are valid or not. We will write to them and we will allow them to express their opinion," the senator said.
Adeyemi's order was made against the backdrop of the justification of such actions by a Deputy Director at the Development Control Office, Mr. Hamza Madaki. He told the joint committee that the demolished Mananuel Estate is located at fake layouts, which were sold to citizens allegedly using forged documents.
“We were not expecting any development in those places at all because there is on-going re-planning of those areas. But what we are seeing is that fraudsters are involved in forging documents and backdating building plans and selling such to unsuspecting Nigerians,” Madaki stated.
He refuted claims by the developers that they got the allocations from the Abuja Municipal Area Council, insisting that only Development Control in the FCT is authorised to give allocation to developers.
Madaki further explained that several notices were issued to developers; the last one being in March this year, just as they were mobilising to those sites to demolish the structures, which were at various stages of completion.
He lamented that developers went ahead to complete the estates, with the hope of evoking emotion and sympathy from public.
"It is unfair for people to ask where we were when they were building. They were so determined to go ahead with the building. The developers deceived the subscribers. Their plan was to finish the building and the issue of legality will be set aside and sentiments and emotion will set in.”
Also, the Zonal AMAC director, Hussain Mohammed, denied giving approval to the developer of the estate. AMAC does not have the authority to approve estates right from day one. Making his case, counsel to the developers of the estate, Mr. Nwoke John Kalu, admitted that the certifications for the land and the building approvals did not emanate from the Development Control, even though he maintained that the documents were original as at the time they were issued in 2004. He however stated that the land was acquired from a previous owner in 2000. Kalu said he did not receive any notice from the Development Control office, nor did he see the newspaper publications by Development Control in 2011, which warned developers to stop work on the land. He accused the FCDA of failing to follow due process in the demolition exercise.
However, on presenting the signed documents for the land, officials of AMAC denied approving the documents saying they were forged. AMAC officials further submitted that they do not have jurisdiction, as their development plan is yet to fully take off and as such they could not have allocated the land to developers.
However in his submission, Adeyemi described the action of the developer as criminal but said he has a moral case because of the civil servants who have to suffer for the demolition.
He said although the documents submitted by the developers showed that they did not comply with the law in acquiring the land, the committee will still need to do further investigations into the matter.
Sen. Adeyemi said the committee is sympathetic to the plights of those who bought plots, who are now at the risk of losing all their investments. He nonetheless promised to look into the case for possible compensation.
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