Why I am not allocating land in FCT – Minister

The Minister of Federal Capital Territory, Mohammed Bello, says one of the most challenging assignments of his office is land matters.

The Minister gave this insight on Monday in Abuja at the 20th edition of the President Muhammadu Buhari’ (PMB) Administration Scorecard Series (2015-2023).

It was reported that the scorecard series was organised by the Ministry of Information and Culture to showcase the achievements of the PMB Administration.

Responding to a question on why he was not allocating land to individual who subscribed, Bello explained that accessing land in the FCT was not going to be easy as it was 20 years back.

He said many individuals that were allocated land in the past 10 years were just holding onto the allocation papers but refused to move to site to build.

Bello said the essence of allocating land to people was to build but a situation where some people would not even locate their land and take possession was not acceptable.

The minister also identified the challenge of infrastructure in districts where many individuals had been allocated land.

He said because the necessary infrastructure was yet to be provided, the allotees might find it difficult to occupy their land and build on it.

Mohammed explained that because of inadequate fund, the FCDA encouraged private sector participation as well as Public-Private-Partnership (PPP) in providing infrastructure to some districts in the territory.

He said it was easier to make such PPP arrangements with private sector developers and cooperatives rather than individuals.

The minister, therefore, encouraged those yearning to get land allocation to go through private developers or form cooperative societies for that purpose.

Speaking on security situation in the territory, Mohammed said the government was on top of the situation and he received security reports on hourly basis in the territory.

According to him, in every one reported case of crime in the territory, ten had been foiled by the security agencies who work round the clock to keep the FCT safe.