From Fred Itua, Abuja
In its bid to restore sanity to the nation’s capital, the FCT Administration, on Thursday, demolished buildings worth millions of naira. The buildings are located within two estates in the Lugbe District of the Federal Capital City (FCC).
Some of the affected buildings were duplexes at their various stages of completion inside Seman Estate, behind Dunamis Church, along Airport Road, in the newly designated District in the FCC.
FCT Administration’s officials, accompanied by security agencies, stormed and cleared some contravening structures situated inside Seman Metropolis Estate behind Dunamis River plate Estate, and Palms Residences opposite ShopRite Pyagasa junction, all in Lugbe.
Explaining the exercise, Senior Special Assistant to FCT Minister on Inspection, Monitoring and Enforcement, Attah Ikharo, said the exercise was part of the FCT enforcement component, aimed at curtailing contraventions against the Land Use Act in the country’s capital city.
He attributed the distortions of the Abuja master plan to the excess of estate developers. He warned them to desist from such, as the FCT Administration will not relent to ensure massive monitoring and enforcement against violations in the area.
He said: “At the point of our inauguration, the minister stressed the need to restore the sanctity and dignity of Abuja Master plan, and restore Abuja to the path the founding fathers want it to be.
“The Department of Development Control approached my office to actually clean up some of the things here. So, we have started massively in the area of violations against the Abuja Masterplan.
“What the minister asked us to do is to engage and re-engage stakeholders to do the right thing, while still standing that we cannot allow illegality in the FCC.
“We will be doing more inspection, monitoring while also stabilising an ensuring that we enforce very strongly.
“All developers must ensure that genuine land and approved plan before commencing development.
“You must also not exceed your boundary, because we see boundary extensions. So developers who contravene , we will be coming very tough against them, and that is the mandate of the minister, you can’t rape the Masterplan and go free.”