Human rights lawyer and activist Deji Adeyanju has raised serious concerns over the construction of about 20 duplexes on a designated green area in Maitama Extension, accusing the Minister of the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), Nyesom Wike, of undermining the Abuja Master Plan by allocating protected land for residential development.
Adeyanju said the development has taken a troubling turn after the developers allegedly discovered that the estate had no approved access road and consequently began converting a natural canal into a roadway.
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He warned that tampering with a natural water channel could result in severe flooding and environmental degradation, particularly during the peak of the rainy season.
“I have just discovered that about 20 duplexes are being constructed on a designated green area in Maitama Extension.
“Even more alarming is the fact that the developers have now realised there is no access road to the estate and have resorted to converting a canal into a road,” Adeyanju said in a statement he shared with THE WHISTLER on Friday.
He added, “One can only imagine the environmental disaster and severe flooding that Maitama Extension will face during the rainy season.
“How do you fence off a green area and then proceed to turn a natural water channel into a road, all in the name of greed?” Adeyanju asked, describing the situation as an environmental disaster waiting to happen.
“This is a blatant distortion of the Abuja Master Plan, and it raises serious questions about how Development Control could have approved such a project in the first place.
“Wike allocated a green area to someone to build residential on it,” he added.
The development in Maitama Extension comes against the backdrop of earlier public disputes surrounding land allocations under Wike’s administration.
In recent months, multiple reports have accused the FCT minister of allocating large parcels of land in high-value districts of Abuja to friends, political associates, and family-linked entities, sparking allegations of nepotism and abuse of office.
Some of the reports claimed that companies allegedly connected to Wike’s children were allocated thousands of hectares of land across different parts of the FCT, with estimated values running into billions of dollars.
Critics also alleged that certain lands were revoked from previous owners and reassigned to individuals or entities with close ties to the minister.
The allegations, however, were firmly denied by Wike’s camp. His media aide, Lere Olayinka, dismissed the reports as “blackmail” and politically motivated propaganda, insisting that no land had been allocated to any of the minister’s children or cronies.
He challenged those making the claims to provide verifiable evidence and argued that some of the reported figures were impossible given the available land mass in the affected districts.
Wike has also defended his broader land policies in the FCT, stating that his administration is focused on restoring order to Abuja’s land administration system, enforcing ground rent payments, and correcting longstanding distortions inherited from previous governments.
He has maintained that land revocations and reallocations carried out under his watch were done strictly in accordance with the law.
Nonetheless, Adeyanju argued that the Maitama Extension development reinforces public fears that green areas and environmentally sensitive zones are being sacrificed for private real estate interests, with potentially disastrous consequences for residents.
He warned that failure to correct the anomaly could expose residents to avoidable flooding and further erode public confidence in Abuja’s urban planning framework.
When contacted, Olayinka said, “I’m out of the country presently. And I can’t possibly get required info (information) because workers are on strike.”