FCT gate
While defending his allocation of a plot of land to one of his wives in a television interview recently, a former Minister of the Federal Capital Territory, Mallam Nasir el-Rufai, said every citizen of Nigeria has the right to apply and be allotted a piece of land in the territory.
That is true in theory. The reality, however, is that you may apply and like Godot in Samuel Beckett’s absurdist play, Waiting for Godot, wait many years for allocation that may never come.
The exception is if you are connected, like el-Rufai’s wife. In fact, the former minister disclosed that she had applied for the land before he became a minister and was lucky that while she was waiting, her husband was appointed the FCT minister.
Responding to the allegation that he allocated lands to his friends and family members, the former minister told his critics to wait until they become ministers so that they could allocate land to their enemies.
For most residents, the prospect of their friends becoming the minister of the territory is slim and going by el-Rufai‘s statement, they may not own a piece of land in the touted Centre of Unity.
This belief makes some residents to go to remote parts of the territory where they think the government cannot revoke the ownership of land they may acquire. In those remote areas, they do deals with indigenous occupants of the land.
Should the government wake up one day and decide it needs such land, those that have bought from indigenes and have erected structures on them expect to be relocated or compensated along with indigenous occupants.
Many residents whose hands were burnt in the demolition of houses supervised by el-Rufai have refrained from purchasing lands from indigenes.
Some now buy land from local government authorities. The reason is that lands purchased from local governments are cheaper than the ones purchased from the FCT Administration.
This has given rise to a boom in business for racketeers who throng the Area Council offices especially the Abuja Municipal Area Council located in the heart of the town.
Opposite the AMAC headquarters, touts and vendors dealing in land gather every day, and wait for victims. Investigations showed that among this group of people, 80 per cent of them is into fraud.
Fake land allocation papers come in different forms. Investigations showed that some forged allocation papers were backdated and put in the sun to give the impression that it had been issued a long time in the past.
Some of the fraudsters also scan fake allocation papers and print them out in order to give the impression that the papers are not new.
The reason the racketeers want to give the impression that the papers are not new is that for some time now, the Area Councils have not been allocating lands but trade in existing ones. So, a dealer that does not have a genuine old allocation paper can forge one, backdate it and create the impression that the paper had been in existence for a long time.
This has been on the increase since February when AMAC closed its doors to officially verifying allocation papers.
Although officially, the verification has stopped, officials of the Area Council claim they can still check the documents unofficially. They collect the allocation papers and a fraction of the official verification fee and then mark it either good or bad. The fraudsters often have agents among Area Council officials who help them to deceive their prospective victims.
After the official must have verified the land in question, the prospective victim receives a level of comfort that could make the deal to proceed. Sometimes, however, a prospective land buyer ends up buying a fake paper.
A surveyor who spoke to our correspondent on the condition of anonymity said sometimes, some private surveyors would go to some virgin areas, discuss with indigenes and design a new layout.
As they develop a layout, they begin to sell allocations in the area while working on their high-level contacts to ensure that the new layout enters into the Area Council database.
If they succeed, those who paid for land in the area smile home with a genuine land allocation paper. But if they fail in getting the layout into the official layout, the allocation paper is worthless and one may never see the agent that sold it.
For those who insist on seeing the land before payment, a land surveyor, Mr. Philip Yaro, warns that it does not guarantee that one will not be duped.
According to him, with a simple Ground Positioning System, one can easily locate any piece of land whether the allocation is genuine or not. ”All that are required are the coordinates. Once you get two or three coordinates, you can locate any piece of land. The ability to locate a piece of land does not mean that the allocation is genuine.
”The irony of the whole thing is that big people in the society also fall victims of the schemes. Once, somebody invited me to come and put pillars in a piece of land in Maitama. A former governor was involved in the deal.
”The place was located on a sewage line. When I looked at the data, I said no; this information belongs to Wuse 2 area. That was the last I heard from them. I was not invited again.
“Look, people are making good money from selling fake land documents. I know some of the racketeers. Some of the flashy cars you see in this city are proceeds from illegal land deals. I have not joined any of the racketeers because my conscience cannot allow me. I will not sleep if such money enters into my pocket,” he said.
While investigating this story, our correspondent met a young graduate who said he relocated to Abuja from Ogun State in February 2010. Now, he is into land business and for him, the price depends on the capacity of his client. According to him, he got interested in the business because his sister built a house and bought a car from it.
The Abuja Geographic Information System was established some years ago to sanitise the disorderly management of Abuja lands through the application of information technology. Its responsibilities include capturing and maintaining datasets such as street addresses, informal settlements and new satellite imagery.
Its functions also include the compilation of personal data of applicants for land, storage and retrieval of cadastral information on layouts; and security and control of access to confidential land information management data, such as acquisition, assessments, allocations, valuations, consents, assignments and registration of land related matters.
Though it has made modest achievements in carrying out these assignments, there is the need to create awareness about its existence and how it can help in land acquisition deals.
Again, some small buyers are not ready for the fees for either fresh applications or for verification services. This is apart from the fact that some view money paid for fresh application as money tied or wasted as official allocation might not come.
Our correspondent also learnt that there were racketeers within the establishment. According to a source, officials involved in the deal look out for empty plots, and instead of bringing the attention of the minister to it, they put it into the system and market it to their unofficial clients.
Because it is easy to lose money in the process of land acquisition, estates have become a popular means for property acquisition to many residents, especially, those that have had ugly experience and those that can afford the burgeoning estates.
The reasoning here is that the estate development company takes the heat and trouble of land acquisition from them. It is, however, those in the middle-class mainstream that can afford this service.
Except the government does something quickly to broaden access to land, racketeering will continue to thrive.
Source:http://www.punchng.com/
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