Government serves "illegal residents" quit notice over water project

After a seven-day notice issued by the Ogun State Urban and Regional Planning Development Board to the residents of Akute, Baale, Akin-Osi and Oke Aro communities to vacate their houses for breaking the Lagos Water Corporation pipeline right of way, the homeowners have begged Ogun state governor Ibikunle Amosun to step in.

The government has also mapped out a 50 meter land space for the proposed project, which the residents recognize as a service to them but are pleading with the government to reduce the land space to about 20 meters so as to minimize the number of displaced and homeless people.

Speaking on the conundrum, the Chairman of the Joint Community Development Council Appeal Committee, Rev. Joshua Adegbola said, “We know they have designed the project as a listening government, we want both states, Lagos and Ogun to help us reduce the number of houses they want to demolish and allow houses that are not directly affected by the pipe to stay. We have been given seven days to present our papers and (or) vacate the place, which is too short for a notice.

“Even as we are aware that there are some houses that will be unavoidably demolished, we want the government to design social programmes to mitigate the effect of the demolition.”

He also noted that most of the affected homeowners are aged and retirees who don’t really have a steady means of communication, therefore pulling down there houses will further aggravate their problems.

“The government should know that meaningful projects are people-driven,” he added.