The Minister of the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), Nyesom Wike, says there is no plan to renege on his demolition warning to landlords of properties distorting the master plan of Abuja.
Wike, who was a guest on Channels Television’s Politics Today on Wednesday, said “there is no going back” on his earlier warning on illegal houses.
A few hours after President Bola Tinubu had inaugurated the ministers on August 21, Wike had sent warning to house owners tampering with the master plan of the capital city.
He added that for anyone who has developed where they are not supposed to, even if the culprit is a minister or an ambassador, “your house must go down.”
Speaking further on Wednesday, the minister lamented that there are rising numbers of uncompleted projects in the city and people taking over the green areas to trade.
“We normally give notice. Take for example what just happened at Asokoro, which is a green area. In fact, I was informed by the building control that they had been trying to take them away, sentiments of this and that.”
“This is the problem we have, you see people trading and the government comes to say, ‘you can’t do this’. Now they go to meet civil society, human rights this – that they have nowhere to stay, they are suffering, economic hardship – that is rubbish,” he insisted.
The Minister maintained that the warning would not be business as usual to residents of the FCT.
“What we have done was to give them notice and they’ve left because it will not be business as usual. Where they will say it is a normal government threat that nothing will happen, they know something will happen and they have moved.”