Trademore Estate Residents Claim They Have Video Evidence FCTA Did Not Do Its Job Before Planning Demolition

Residents of the Trademore estate, along airport road, have stated that the Federal Capital Territory Administration did not carry out due diligence before declaring the estate a disaster zone, adding it has no right to demolish property in the estate.

The residents made this known on Monday in Abuja during a press briefing, after the area was declared a disaster zone, following a flood incident that occurred in the estate after a downpour on the 23rd of June.

According to the Chairman, Adewale Adenaike, the estate was built in 2007 when Abuja Municipal Area Council (AMMAC) was in charge of land allocation, and the estate got the allocation papers and approval from AMMAC.

Speaking to pressmen on the legality of the estate, Adenaike said, “When the FCTA took over all land allottees were requested to come for recertification, which the developer did at the time. No single allottee along the airport road has been decertified to date.

“How then is the land illegal, going by this narrative of the FCTA means there’s no legal estate on the entire airport road in Abuja which is preposterous. 90% of all the houses in the estate are on mortgage, financed by the Federal Mortgage Bank and institution of the federal government.

“Would the Federal Mortgage Bank or the federal govt of Nigeria have given loans to individuals to buy houses without verifying the authenticity of the land title? And you are saying the federal govt won’t have done their due diligence before loans are released. That is the narrative of the government agency.”

He also wondered whether the Nigerian Police would have bought 100 units of houses in the estate without investigating the genuineness of the land title.

“The commissioning of those units was carried out by the then vice president of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, Mohammed Namadi Sambo. Are you telling me that the vice president of Nigeria came to commission an illegal estate?

“Trademore estate is not one house, two houses, or three units. We are over 2000 units here, are we saying that development control was unaware when those houses were built? Trademore estate alone has three polling units, when votes were taken from here it is not illegal, when tenements rates are taken from here it is not illegal, when land charges and other numerous charges from the same estate were collected the estate is not illegal. Now that time has come to provide stormwater into the structure, they declared us illegal,” he said.

Speaking further, he revealed that the estate is a cash cow for AEDC, adding that they make as “much as N30 million per month from the estate which has been declared illegal,” demanding that the FCT Administration should answer the questions, and also tell the “world the truth of what’s really going on.”

While stressing that Trademore Estate is not illegal and it’s being financed by the federal government of Nigeria, he questioned the illegality of the estate, adding that it’s not a disaster zone as pronounced by the government.

He said, “Trademore estate is not a disaster zone rather what we have is a leadership disaster. Who are unable to carry out their primary responsibilities. The perm sec who declared here a disaster zone did not even enter the estate or carry out any form of investigation, he came with a crew of about 20 Lexus jeeps and Hilux, and as soon as it started raining, he ran away, we have videos and evidence.”

“What we need is the implementation of the already provided solutions to the flooding, not the easy blame game that the FCT administration is trying to play.”

While giving a broader explanation of how the flooding started, Adenaike said the massive estate development in the area has increased the flooding as some of the estates around divert water to the estate.

He noted that the Lugbe area has a minimum of 17 estates and blamed the flooding on the Aleta dam which he said should be reevaluated.

The resident, however, asked the government to proffer a solution to prevent reoccurrence and noted that they shall resist the demolition plan.

While stating that the FCTA has no legal right to demolish the estate, the chairman said, “There’s a subsisting court restriction saying that they can not demolish, and it was issued in 2022 as a perpetual injunction against FCTA and other agencies. The case is still in court. They have no legal right to come here and demolish a single property.

“We are not ready to fight the government, we are asking for collaboration. Demolition is a basic engineering approach and there is an engineering solution to what we have here.”

THE WHISTLER reported on Monday morning that residents of Trademore Estate shut their gates in protest against the planned demolition of structures in the estate by officials of the FCTA.

The FCDA had declared the estate a disaster zone and urged residents to promptly evacuate.