Abuja Real Estate Investors Panic as Wike Reads Riot Act

After being inaugurated as minister of the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), everyone was expecting a calm speech by Nyesom Wike the former governor of Rivers State, but his speech portrayed a man who is ready to take action immediately.

After President Bola Tinubu swore in 45 ministers on Monday, Wike went immediately to brief the press and public on what we call the "Riot Act". He was specific about those who redesigned the Nation's capital to their taste without following the blueprint given by the FG.

He cried IT WILL GO DOWN…

He stated categorically that any person found wanting will face the consequences and he won't feel sorry for them. "If it happened before, it won't happen under this administration". 

I'll come back with some interesting reviews about the new FCT Minister, but for now, let's have a look at his statement.

It reads,

• All those people who are distorting the master plan of Abuja, too bad! If you know you’ve built where you’re not supposed to build, it will go down.

• Be you a minister or ambassador, if you know you have developed where you are not supposed to develop, your house must go down.

• Those who have taken over the green areas to build, sorry, our parks must come back. The green areas must come back. If you hate green, you hate yourself.

• Those who have taken over the parks and green areas where you now do restaurants, we would not accept that. It will go down.

• And all those people who are doing land racketeering, that period is over. And for those that the government has allocated lands to them and they refused to develop, the land is gone.

• I’m going to revoke them because I don’t understand how land that you may have paid for N200,000, you now begin to find who will buy it for N2 billion. Who does that?

• We will take back our land and give it to those who want to develop. And you must sign that you must develop at a certain time.

Back Story

FCT is the home of the President and it has always adhered strictly to blueprints from the FG. Looking back at one of the controversial ministers of the Federal Capital Territory, Mallam Nasiru El-Rufai, who is also the former governor of Kaduna State—he was a man who demolished thousands of structures that didn't align with the development plan of the FCT—these structures worth millions of naira. 

He even continued with this act in Kaduna State as he demolished houses that were built on roads (creating little space for motorists). He even went further to demolish "Gbagyi Villa," a residential area that housed many retired staff of state and public firms. His reasons were that those lands were owned by the Kaduna State Government and for the sole purpose of the extension of the Kaduna Polytechnic.

He was later charged to court by Shehu Sani, a sitting Senator then. The court later stopped El-Rufai from carrying on with his demolition.

Insights

One will wonder why Tinubu gave Nyesom Wike such an important role in his administration despite coming from different political parties, but from all indications, no soft-hearted person can restructure the FCT. To restructure, you'll have to demolish.

Let's see it plays out, but Wike is a man of his word.