BY  CHARLES KUMOLU

HOUSING is universally accepted as the second most important human need after food. By virtue of the  provisions of Section 16(1)(d) of the 1999 Constitution under the Fundamental Objectives and Directive Principles of State Policy, Nigeria is supposed “to provide suitable and adequate shelter for all Citizens’’.

No wonder President Goodluck Jonathan in his Transformation Agenda and Vision 20:2020, made the accessible and the provision of affordable housing one of the strategic national imperatives for guaranteeing the well-being and productivity of the citizenry. This strategic mandate is supervised by the  Minister of Lands, Housing and Urban Development, Ms. Ama Pepple.

The acknowledgment of this mandate is captured in the ministry’s vision statement, which is “To establish a sustainable housing delivery system that will ensure easy access to home ownership and rental schemes by the Nigerian populace in an environment where basic physical and social amenities are available’’.

Restating this recently, Ms Pepple said:  “The housing sector has the capacity to reduce crime rates, insurrection, militancy, terrorism and substantially address wealth distribution and security problems, while our cities are centres of economic growth and centres for commerce and wealth creation, and for the promotion of healthy living environments.”

This explains why the Housing and Urban Development ministry has left no stone unturned in its efforts aimed at realizing this mandate.

One of Ms Pepple’s greatest successes is the reviewing and updating of both the national housing policy and the national urban development policy.

Instructively, the major aim of this, according to the Minister  is to ensure “that all Nigerians own or have access to decent, safe and sanitary housing in healthy environments with infrastructural services at affordable cost, with secure tenure and, to promote a dynamic system of urban settlements, which fosters sustainable economic growth, promotes efficient urban and regional planning and development, as well as ensures improved standard of living and well-being of Nigerians.”

According to the Minister, a ministerial team for housing delivery in Nigeria had been inaugurated to propose modalities for implementation of the reviewed policies. Pepple also noted that benefits from the project include; the delivery of 1,873 housing units through the agencies of the Federal Housing Authority, FHA,  the Federal Mortgage Bank of Nigeria, the Public Private Partnership, PPP Initiative and directly through the Ministry.

In addition, she added that no fewer than 24,188 units were on-going. ‘’The PPP unit of the Ministry alone has engaged 89 developers to build 17,267 houses on a total expanse of 889 hectares. There are also housing schemes in Kuje, Abuja and Asaba, Delta state,’’ she said.

Challenges andachievements: A key challenging area of Pepple’s mandate is in the arena of social housing. Though efforts in this critical turf were linked to a collaboration with Aso Savings & Loans and the FMBN to develop 144 mixed housing units at Lugbe, Abuja, as well as 1,000 units under another partnership with a private developer, more needs to be done here.

Vanguard Homes & Property checks revealed that progress is being made in other areas, such as the partnership under the PPP Initiative with Cyrus. Plans are underway to build unity villages in each of the six geo-political zones of the country. Similarly, a 109 unit estate by Royal Sanderton is awaiting commissioning in Lagos State.

Other achievements include: the conversion of 12,500 analogue and cadastral maps to the digital equivalent; the issuance of 1,291 certificates of occupancy in respect of Federal government lands; the agreement of the FCT ministry to issue C-of-Os to about 5,000 beneficiaries of the FHA Gwarimpa housing scheme; the establishing of 15 fully serviced residential plots per site in 13 states of the six geopolitical zones of the Federation and the FCT;

Others include: the rehabilitation and maintenance of the 23 existing Federal secretariats in the country and the construction of six new Federal secretariats at a total cost of 14 billion Naira; the completion of 259 projects, covering the execution of public buildings and utilities, construction/ upgrading of access roads, slum electrification, water and sanitation under the Millennium Development Goals (MDG) programme.

In the mortgage finance sector, the opening of a loan window by the FMBN using co-operative structures to expand mortgage financing to the non-salaried informal sector; the development of a joint working program with the Cities Alliance (World Bank Group) to undertake a comprehensive survey on housing that will assess and identify data gaps in the sector, appear to be the minister’s greatest achievements.

Mortgage finance sector
Other developments  within the mortgage finance sector include a roundtable on Mortgage finance hosted by the Finance Minister to address major concerns on affordable housing and mortgage finance, and to obtain alignment on the implementation steps required to achieve a vibrant and diversified sector.

The roundtable secured stakeholders’ commitments to establish a private Nigerian Mortgage Refinance Company PNMRC which would make catalytic investments in strategic financial institutions that would mobilise funding to the sector..

As Ms Pepple puts it:  “Housing carries a huge potential for job creation. For 1,000 units of 2-bedrooms, we can create 76,000 jobs.  I believe that Nigeria can create 2,812,000 jobs on an annual basis if as many as 1,000 units of two-bedroom bungalows are built annually in each of the 36 states of the federation and the FCT.’’