Afro-Asia Shelters, REDAN, Shelter Afrique Seal Over N44 bn Housing Deal

Shelter Afrique, the Pan-African finance institution, has entered into a memorandum of understanding (MoU) with Afro-Asia Shelters International, a subsidiary of the Chicason Group to provide funding worth N44billion for housing development in Abuja.

Under the agreement, Shelter Afrique would provide funds for the phase 1 of a 3,000-unit housing estate, while the phase 2 would cost about N5.2billion with Shelter Afrique contributing 59 per cent and Chicason Group 41 per cent of the development cost.

Sealing the deal on the sidelines of Shelter Afrique 35th annual general meeting and symposium in Abuja, the chief operating officer, Rock of Ages Properties Limited, Mr. Francis Onwuemele, said the MoU was in furtherance of its resolve to provide decent residential accommodation to Nigerians in the public and private sectors.

He commended Shelter Afrique for recognising the contributions of his organisation towards the development of the housing sector adding that his company has acquired 443 hectares of land at Lugbe for the federal government’s mass housing scheme.

Onwuemele noted that the group was committed to the development of decent residential estates across the country in partnership with the Trade Union Congress (TUC) of Nigeria even as he submitted that the intervention fund would fast-track its partnership with the TUC to provide affordable housing to Nigerian workers.

In a related development, the Real Estate Developers Association of Nigeria (REDAN) also signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) with Shelter Afrique during the 35th annual general meeting of the Pan-African financial institution in Abuja.

The president of REDAN, Rev Ugochukwu Chime, said the agreement would facilitate loan acquisition, training and research development for its members.

While revealing the possibility of brainstorming on how Kenya, Ghana and Cote d’voire were able to tackle bottlenecks associated with mass housing, he regretted that many Nigerians could hardly access housing mortgage.

To this end, he disclosed that a ‘rent to own scheme’ would be introduced for payment of rents that would culminate into eventual home ownership.

He recalled that a similar MoU was signed with the University of Lagos,  Chartered Institute of Housing London, DFID,  GEMS3 to train and bridge the skills gap among developers and artisans.

Chime maintained that the partnership would rejuvenate the potentials in the housing sector and kick-start the economy as is obtainable in countries like South Africa and United Kingdom where 30 per cent and 62 per cent of their GDP’s were  from the housing sector.

On his part, CEO of Fesadeb Communications, Barr. Festus Adebayo, congratulated the real estate body for the giant strides in signing the MoU with the Pan- African financial institution.

Adebayo, who is the organiser of Abuja housing show and housing programme on AIT promised to assist REDAN in providing affordable housing for Nigerian workers.

Reacting, the managing director of Shelter Afrique, James Mugerwa, said the institution remained committed to the shared vision of its founding fathers to tackle the ever growing housing deficit in Africa.

–Leadershipng