1m houses annually possible through collaboration — Buhari

The Federal Government is targeting the development of about one million housing units annually in collaboration with states and the private sector. 

President Muhammadu Buhari disclosed this at a two-day National Economic Council retreat in Abuja last week. He said the Federal Government will provide 250,000 units, the 22 States controlled by the All Progressives Congress (APC) are expected to jointly provide 250,000 houses while foreign investors and their local partners would provide the remaining 500,000 units.

“Some estimates put Nigeria’s housing deficit at about 16 million units. In our successful campaign to win the general election last year, our party, the APC, promised to build a million housing units a year. This will turn out to be a very tall order unless the Federal Government builds 250,000 units, and the 22 APC States together manage another 250,000 units. We invite foreign investors together with locally-domiciled big construction companies to enter into commercial housing building to pick up the rest,” he stated.

Buhari identified the concerns of Nigerians regarding housing sector to include severe shortage of housing, high rents, unaffordable prices for prospective buyers, especially middle and low-income earners.

“In addition, red tape, corruption and plain public service inefficiency lead to long delays in obtaining ownership of title documents. Again, there are no long term funding sources for mortgage purposes. These hurdles are by no means easy to scale, but we must find solutions to the housing deficit,” he added.

The president declared that government would review the relevant laws to make the process of acquiring statutory right of occupancy shorter, less cumbersome and less costly. He added that court procedures for mortgage cases should make enforcement more efficient while the Federal Ministry of Works and Housing should upgrade its title registration system for greater efficiency. He also said transparent processes and procedures were necessary for achieving affordable housing for all Nigerians apart from developing strong and enduring mortgage institutions, adding that the Nigerian Mortgage Re-financing Company (NMRC), when fully operational, should ensure adequate support for mortgage financing.

Source: Vanguard 

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