By Yakubu Ahmed-BK
The Kebbi state government has explained how a property development concern known as ANDP came into Kebbi state with a promising and mouth watering idea of building 5000 houses for the less privileged in the state, but ended up scamming unsuspecting contractors.
The Permanent Secretary Ministry of Lands and Housing, Alhaji Malami Shekare who was responding to a news item earlier today on the abandonment of the construction of 5000 houses in the state, exempted the Kebbi state government of any complicity or having a hand in the project, other than on some oversights in the agreed terms.
He said, in a telephone conversation with journalists that, ANDP approached the state government some two years ago, as it did to many other states in the country on its intention to partner government to build a total of 5000 of such houses for the less privileged in Kebbi state.
According to him, the state government signed an MoU which stipulated that it will only provide certificates of occupancy for 100 hectares of land for that purpose, guarantee bank loans and compensate land owners.
The Kebbi state government, he further said, had fulfilled its own part of the deal.
He remarked that under the agreement, 2000 of the houses were to be built in Birnin Kebbi, while 3000 were to be spread to Argungu, Zuru, Yauri and Kamba.
Shakare added that ANDP personally engaged contractors, collected N200,000 from each of them as registration fees against his personal objection and convinced each contractors to start work with their own resources.
The various levels of work on the houses, he added, were attained by the contractors themselves, only for ANDP to abandon the whole agreement and went away.
Why did the government not revoke the MoU and take possession of the entire project on behalf of the contractors when it dawned on it that ANDP was not sincere?
The Permanent Secretary said the agreeent stipulated two years for it to mature for revocation and that since the two years have already elapsed, government is in the process of terminating the agreement.
What will be the fate of the contractors who have expended fortunes already to take the project to appreciable levels, in the event that the MoU is revoked?
Shekare affirmed that one of the options was s for the contractors to take full and unconditional possession of the houses including all ownership of the land and the certificates of occupancy, and decide either to finish them for sale or to occupy them.
He said, “as soon as the recommendation is approved, it will promptly be implemented without any shred of delay”.
