Lagos Permanent Secretary accused of illegal construction

Residents of 14, Bodunrin Caulcrick Road, a compound located within the LSDPC Phase I Estate, Ogba, Ikeja, Lagos State, have cried out over what they described as usurpation and encroachment on supportive space meant to ease lives in their portion of the estate.

They described the illegal conversion, allegedly perpetrated by a Permanent Secretary, PS (names withheld) in the Lagos State Civil Service, as a way by which the powerful trample on the weak.

The PS, who, according to findings, is still in service, was alleged to have connived with two other residents in the neighbourhood to carry out the act. It was gathered that the PS being the arrow-head in the unfortunate development, claimed that nobody can question him, apparently because of his connection to the corridors of power in the state.

But wife of the affected neighbour, whose space was encroached upon, Mrs Adedeji narrated her concerns to journalists.

The structures on the disputed space present an eyesore. There are three buildings: a two-storey building, a single storey building and another one which is still under construction. The irony is that there is hardly any space in between the houses. A side of the fence around the structures was marked with a red sign, which shows that work on the construction should stop. This order was discountenanced as work on the construction has continued.

Speaking to journalists during a visit to the estate, Mrs Adedeji said the residents were not comfortable with the illegal construction because it has made living in the estate hellish for them.

She allegedly lost her mother a couple of years ago due a nail-wound which resulted into tetanus complications. She alleged that the PS and two other neighbours converted the open space meant for her use, into structures, apparently because they were well connected.

Her words: “We were told that they went to LSDPC and that the LSDPC sold the space to them for N100,000. A space that LSDPC planned with our blocks of flats for our own convenience? As close as we are, this man, the PS, did not tell us what was going on. All we knew was that one day, we saw workers working on the space. We challenged them to know who gave them the job. It was then that one of them appealed to us to allow him erect a make-shift shop for his wife. Although we were not comfortable with that, we later saw that makeshift shops had started developing into big buildings”.

“The danger in this is that artisans who did the foundation, did it for shops and not for residential blocks of flats that have sprung up there. are now there today because the LSDPC did not plan this estate this way. We saw later that they started to deck what they built as makeshift shorts and then added another floor and then another floor and so they have two-storey building on foundation that was not only unfit but also on a ground meant for the use of the neighbourhhood and for illegal structure not approved. If they say that LSDPC sold the space to them and that they got approval for the kind of buildings they have erected, we want to know who in LSDPC did that? She queried.

Efforts to get the permanent secretary to react to the allegation proved fruitless. The Public Relations Officer of the Lagos State Physical Planning Development Authority, LAPPDA, who was contacted, promised to get back to journalists.