FG Moves to Reduce Cost of Housing Delivery by 30%

The Permanent Secretary, Ministry of Lands, Housing and Urban Development, Mr. George Ossi, on Monday said government is developing a blueprint to reduce cost of housing delivery by 30%.

The disclosure was contained in a statement, signed by the Ministry’s Director of Public Affairs, Mr. Ajibola Adedeji, in Abuja.

Ossi in the statement, averred that government will intervene through the provision of land, infrastructure, and payment of compensation to land owners.

According to him, the overall effect of the reduction will positively impact on the 17 million housing deficit.
According to him, the committee on affordable housing delivery set by the ministry to look into the blueprint for affordable and social housing delivery in the country has submitted its report.

The Permanent Secretary said the report was important and of immense value in the face of concerted effort by government to provide affordable housing for Nigerians.

He identified the need for direct government intervention to developers and off-takers in obtaining loans to finance housing projects and payment of compensation to original land owners.

He assured the committee that following the recent briefing by the ministry to President Muhammadu Buhari, government would look into it and come up with a position that will benefit all Nigerians, regarding affordable housing delivery.

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The statement also added that the Chairman of the Committee, who is the Director, Planning, Research and Statistics in the ministry, Mr Aithelbert Mouka, said the committee noted that access to adequate and affordable housing was recognised as a core human right by the United Nations (UN), General Assembly Article 25, 1948, the 1999 Constitution of Nigeria and the Vision 20: 2020 document.

He said: “The committee identified the challenges to include affordability gap in home-ownership; dearth of long -term funds; inadequate capital and resource base for the primary mortgage institutions.”

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