Consistent Housing Needed To Solve Mass Housing Deficit Problem In Nigeria – Al-Amin

The managing director (MD/CEO), Federal Housing Authority (FHA), Professor Mohammed Al-Amin, has stated that consistent provision of mass housing is needed if the government has to solve the problem of mass housing deficit in the country.

The FHA MD, who gave this hint in an exclusive interview with Leadershipng said that even though housing deficit is a global phenomenon, the effect is more in Nigeria.

He, therefore, stressed on the steps the government should take to address the problem and provide affordable housing to the masses.

Al-Amin said poor capital and budgetary allocation by previous governments had been the bane of the housing sector as it made it difficult to meet up with housing demands in the country.

He said, “The housing issue is a phenomenal problem globally and it is much more in Nigeria. The concept of closing that deficit whether it is called mass housing, social housing or affordable housing, in Nigeria is a function of so many things. One, the government intervention in terms of capital and budgetary allocation is so small over the years that it cannot produce houses to meet up with the increasing population in the country.

“Then, to solve this quagmire in which we are in terms of housing, is to employ mass housing in all its ramifications; that is, to involve both the end-users as well as those in the housing business to join hands with government to ensure that housing demand is actually met by adequate housing supply. The only secret of doing it is to be consistently producing houses; not to produce houses, for instance, during Shagari’s administration’s housing scheme and go into oblivious state. It has to be consistent over time and that is how we can solve the problem of solving housing deficit.”

The MD further called for the need to embrace modern technology and new models of facilitating mortgages, stressing that continuous use of old methods is rather a clog in the wheel in the housing sector. “Secondly, the models of doing things in the housing industry in this country are archaic while in other countries, you see new models of creating mortgages, new models of building houses, new technologies of construction, new materials being invented. In this country, we are still on the same technology, with the same materials and with the same ideas that we have been using since independence. That is actually a very big problem.”